


Don't Wait For Me

by AstroangelNova



Category: MCSM, Minecraft (Video Game), Minecraft Story Mode
Genre: Afterlife, Canonical Character Death, Gen, Grief/Mourning, How do I use these things?, Hurt/Comfort, Jesse (Minecraft) mentioned, Minor Violence, Non-Graphic Violence, Other Additional Tags to Be Added
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-13
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:34:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 22
Words: 43,429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26989075
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AstroangelNova/pseuds/AstroangelNova
Summary: Ellegaard is dead....Well, she's supposed to be- but things are a bit more complicated than that.There's a lot to figure out here, and even more to fear.Good luck.
Relationships: Ellegaard the Redstone Engineer/Magnus the Rogue
Comments: 47
Kudos: 20





	1. The End

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We cannot have a beginning without an end.

She was flying, sailing, flailing her limbs as she reeled from _Its_ impact.

Time slowed to an agonizing, tentative crawl as every fiber of muscle in her body painfully tensed in wait for… Something. What was-

_Oh._

There it was. 

Time, in that moment, sped up- it sped past her, it escaped her. She strained, pulled to keep up.

The thing, it hit her- No, she hit it- She collided, and she _shattered_ , and she didn’t know what was wrong but she knew it was bad, and- Oh gosh, it _hurt_ \- And her back- Spine, there was the word- Was it broken? Was that- 

No, of course it was, what _else_ could it be-

Her heart sped, thumping a deafening beat in her ears, and an all too familiar plunging coolness spread through her veins. Why couldn’t she _move_ , darn it- How long did she have? No, don’t think like that- she choked back a sob as pain seared through her every limb- It was going to be fine. It was just a- she felt so _heavy, too heavy_ -

“....E.. Ellie?” A voice said, cracking already with the burden of guilt untold. Thoughts vanished as she struggled to meet a gaze. Flaming red hair came close until it was right there, attached to the face of a friend- a part of home- that she missed for so long. 

Her heart grew weary, and began to take notice of its own damage; breaking its sprint and settling for a belabored, aching rhythm. Mind, once racing, took notice and began to follow- slowing to a quiet hum as she took in the changes in his face that she hadn’t been around to see. Had he always had those dark circles under his eyes?

Soren had been speaking to her, the tones of his voice frantic with worry as he rushed to assure her, and she found herself straining to redirect her focus to what he was saying.

“You fought valiantly, my friend.”

She found her own mouth opening.

“You and I both know… My fight… Is over... “

She began to feel heavy in a way she couldn’t recall, broken shards of _something_ digging into her insides.

When did Jesse appear next to her? She couldn’t remember them walking over, and yet there they were. The sight of her armor on them- holding together, protecting them- filled her with an emotion she couldn’t recognize or classify.

“Stuff and nonsense… Stuff and nonsense.” Soren’s voice swam into her head again, and he was quick to stop her as she struggled to turn her head towards him. “Save your strength, Ellegaard. We’ll take care of this. We’ll take care of you.”

A part of her longed for that to be true, despite her fading strength and shattered bones. _We_ , he had said. Not just him, but the rest of the friends she loved so dearly. They- They’d all be together again?

Upon further introspection, she decided that she’d like that. 

She’d like that very much.

She would have loved to continue her train of thought, but she had something to do.

Turning to the young hero, she spoke. 

“Jesse.”

“Ellegaard.”

There were so many things she wanted to say; things she wished she had known much earlier.

She decided she’d word it as best as she knew how.

“My armor… Really suits you... Jesse. I want you to keep it, okay?” She had hardly finished her sentence before a look of shock crossed their face.

They seemed to struggle with themself for a moment, a whirlwind of emotions crossing their features, before looking back at her and…

“Thank you, Ellegaard. For everything.”

She wanted to say more. She wanted to _do_ more.

Words stuck in her throat, pushing to be spoken- and all she found herself talking about was her final adventure, apologizing for having to leave early, telling Soren that at least she got to be a-

The sense of finality was becoming overwhelming, but she found her focus drifting to just behind the young hero.

There were _people_ . They stumbled out from _Its_ rotting mass by the hundreds, confused and weary… And so _beautifully_ alive. Noticing her gaze shift, Jesse turned to look and experienced her same surprise.

“All those people… they’re alive! The Wither Storm didn’t kill them!”

She saw a hope in the young hero’s eyes that she hadn’t seen in a very long time.

She had to hurry. “Jesse-- those people-- you have to help them. All of them.”

Their expression settled into determination as they gently picked up her hand.

“Of course I’ll save them-- every one of them. We’re the good guys, right? That’s what we do.”

She wanted to get up. She wanted to see her friends, to hug them, to-

Her strength faded.

Her eyes closed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter one..? Did I do it...?
> 
> Ahh I think so! A very special thanks to Ivy and Pearly for beta reading this chapter for me, I really really appreciate your help!! ^^
> 
> (The title may also change a couple thousand times!!)


	2. Crater

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things happened in the crater that day, both seen and unseen.

Unconsciousness wasn’t the right term for it. It was deeper, an absence of thought that evaded all concepts of time and space- it swallowed mindfulness and left a silent hum of a void unfilled.

Ellegaard wasn’t even aware of her own existence until the whispers started.

They began so softly, so gently, that it was near impossible to tell when they had begun. But once she started listening, they halted abruptly- leaving behind a surge of phantom pain that rested in her weak consciousness.

She surrendered, and let herself slip back into unfeeling.

-

_Open your eyes._

The thought came so suddenly into her mind, a brilliant beam of light slicing through suffocating darkness. She eagerly obeyed, letting herself reach out towards the familiar voice in her head.

It didn’t fail her. Ellegaard opened her eyes to find herself lying beside an all too familiar spruce tree- or, what was left of it at least. A stump of wood, jagged and splintered, sat a couple inches away from her head.

Wait- what was she _doing_?

Memories came flooding back, and with it a dull ache- _It_ , the tentacle, the bomb… The _people_. Where had everyone gone? A pang of fear jolted through her; it was imperative that she get to them as soon as possible.

Pulling herself to her feet, she surveyed the destruction that seemed to stretch as far as the eye could see.

It hadn’t been like this before… What happened?

Before she could even begin to analyze a possible course of action, a sickeningly familiar roar shook the ripped earth around her, the guttural tones seeming to even rattle the clouds above. There was hardly enough time for the panic to register; it was followed by a deafening blast that sent shockwaves through the corrupted sky.

Legs were bolting, carrying her faster and farther than she could have ever thought possible. Ellegaard bounded over flattened hills and land riddled with aftershocks until she arrived at their source- a deep crater in the earth, carved out by a larger than life menace. The heavens, now clear of the looming monstrosity, shifted from wisteria to radiant blue of noon- the sun reclaimed its apex in the sky, and the clouds seemed to bow in return.

Towards the center, a small gathering of people congregated around a figure she now recognized as Jesse- coughing, speaking, and… Panicked? 

They spun on their heel and bolted over to something she couldn’t make out; bending down, they seemed to console it in a soothing voice laced with worry. And then-

It was getting hard to see. Ellegaard stepped further down into the crater, the ground silent beneath her feet. As she approached, she could make out Jesse’s now anguished face- they quietly bowed their head as a wisp of snow colored mist rose. 

It climbed steadily, refracting delicate rays of sunlight into the smallest streaks of iridescence. A silent melody that rang eternal, it held Ellegaard’s gaze as it sailed into the soft clouds, and until she could no longer distinguish between the two.

She had arrived at the bottom. The others congregated around Jesse as quiet murmurs were exchanged amongst themselves, some of them unable to stop the tears from streaming down their cheeks. Unsure of where to even begin, she spoke the first words that came to mind:

“...I’m sorry.”

Now, it wasn’t that she had expected a response; grief was a suffocating burden, and she knew that all too well. But she found it rather peculiar that none of them even turned around to look- hadn’t they wondered where she was? 

Cautiously, so as not to disturb them, she reached out a hand towards Jesse’s back…

...And felt her stomach plummet when her fingers went through them.

Letting out a yelp of horror and stumbling backwards, she lost her footing and fell into a group of exposed dirt piles- her midsection phased into several of them.

“...No, _nonono_ ….”

She rushed to her feet, arms outstretched as she staggered back towards the group of unsuspecting mourners. 

“Please, please, _please_ -”

Grabbing frantically at their hands- someone’s, _anyone’s_ \- her breathing hastened, and dark spots began to swim in her vision. Her heart pounded- Was it even pounding? Was _that_ even real?- as she grasped for the slightest hint of tangibility capable of letting _someone_ know she was there.

The heroes, still none the wiser, helped their grieving friend to their feet- each resting a gentle hand on Jesse’s shoulders. Steadily, they all began the climb out of the cavity.

“No- No!! Please, don’t leave me here!!” she cried, tripping over her own feet in her attempt to follow the group out. She hit the ground hard, effectively sending her senses into a frenzy as she struggled to get up.

By the time she had righted herself, the group of young victors had already reached the ground up above. She caught a fleeting glimpse of Jesse, still donning her armor, before they vanished from her field of sight.

Ellegaard put her knees to her forehead and screamed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woohoo!! Second chapter complete!! 😊  
> This one was a bit of a leap of faith since I stepped away from canon, but it was really fun to tap into some good old imagination!!  
> (I still have zero idea what I'm doing, but I guess first writings are supposed to be a learning experience!)  
> (This chapter might also be a little shorter than I wanted it to be.. But if there's anything I can do better, I'll do my best to work on it!! 😊)


	3. Drown

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stay afloat.

Ellegaard considered herself the kind of person that wasn’t a puppet to their emotions. She prided herself on logic and reason above feeling and heart; not that it was anything against those who felt, of course. Neither was it that she didn’t like having sentiments- they were beautiful things when desired, and she believed that they made up a core part of everyone’s being.

_But there’s a time and place for everything,_ she thought to herself, having crawled out of the crater. If emotions were brought too far into logic, it would result in bias. And if logic were brought too far into emotion, it would result in tactlessness.

Now was the time for thought, for analysis. After pulling herself together, she had decided to head back to the tree she had awoken beside. 

_I can determine a better course of action from there._

Walking back gave her a better opportunity to survey the true extent of the damage caused. The ground had been stripped bare, deep ravines gouged into the heart of the earth from an insatiable hunger.

Looking at that didn’t do anything about the encroaching uneasiness that loomed behind her- and by the time she had made it back to the spruce tree, she found a couple deep breaths were necessary. 

(Not that they helped.)

The sun had relinquished its perch to the moon, taking with it the radiance of day. Night settled softly into the sky, and draped a gentle cloak of stars over the sleeping earth. The occasional undead groan was accompanied by the hissing of nearby arachnids as they roamed the terrain, searching for something unbeknownst to even themselves. Much further away, Ellegaard could almost make out the faint glow of a gathering, warm light barely illuminating the distant trees.

Ellegaard sat down next to the beaten stump, heaving a sigh and resting her chin on her knees. Though she wasn't tired, per se, her mind was certainly bound to crash at some point- and despite all attempts to stay lucid, the familiar sensation of numbness washed over her.

She closed her eyes again. 

-

Entering whatever phase she was in felt even more natural this time around, and it felt good to rest her mind and dissociate. So she did just that, letting herself drift through null abyss.

That made it all the more alarming when the whispering started again, slithering into her consciousness with a sudden ferocity that sent shocks through her system.

And that was when the pain began.

It felt as though her body was ripping itself apart with her still inside, blistering heat slicing through her joints and plunging her mind into a state of frantic struggle.

The murmuring seemed to only grow in intensity, surrounding and swallowing her whole as they deafened her hearing. Mind writhed and twisted where her body could not- the now suffocating pain threatened to tear her to pieces.

Arms from shoulders. 

Legs from hips.

Head from neck.

Heart from chest.

She began to fight with a fervor she hadn’t known she possessed, feeling her entire body shake with the strain. 

If the whispers were drowning, then she would struggle upwards with every last fiber of her being.

Ellegaard knew she was on the right path when the murmurs dropped suddenly in volume, almost as if in shock. Once they did, she found that it was significantly easier to _think_ , and to grasp for her hold in reality. Murkiness was clearing, and she could hear her own heartbeat again.

She had arrived at the surface.

The dazzling rays of consciousness streaming into the unsavory abyss illuminated her hands as she reached.

-

Much farther away, gentle feet tiptoed to bed. Jesse was exhausted, and with good reason- the past few days had been nothing short of hectic.

Everyone here had something missing- a shard of themself that hurt to live without. Some were more damaged, with gaping holes in their hearts that they couldn’t even try to conceal- while others had cracks that they wore quietly, masked with blank stares.

But no matter how much or how little had been lost, they had all come together. 

Each person brought their broken pieces to one another. And although there was never a perfect shard to fill a cavity, fragments were exchanged between them so that everybody would come one step closer. What couldn’t be given to someone else was used externally; broken souls laid down the foundations for something new- different from _Before_ , but a promise of hope.

And thus, they had all been slowly building the beginnings of somewhere they could all start anew; cherishing the faraway dreams of the past as they turned towards the future. They had started building already, everyone bringing some unique aspect of themselves; houses and shops began to fit together in an interlocking chain.

As Jesse began to drift off into the gentle embrace of sleep, they remarked to themself that it was the most beautiful thing they had ever seen.

The torches outside cast a warm glow onto closed eyelids that fluttered gently in sleep. 

Broken hearts softly beat together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Super big thank you (and an even bigger hug) to Rainy, who beta read this chapter for me!! 😊 You're awesome!!  
> This chapter was such an experiment in so many ways, and it's not nearly as long as I want it to be- but I think once I get a little further into this, they'll start to get longer consistently!!
> 
> I hope you enjoyed, and see you next chapter!! 😊


	4. Manners

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Patience is a virtue.

Upon opening her eyes, Ellegaard was greeted with a dusty dawn sky; billowing clouds silhouetted by golden streaks of rising sun signalled the end of the nightly reign of the monsters, who had already begun to retreat. A light breeze sent nearby strands of grass into a jovial dance.

She let herself lay there for a moment, gathering her strength and beginning to take inventory of her own aches.

What in the  _ world _ was that?

The searing pain from  _ whatever _ happened earlier had dulled to a persistent throbbing that resided where limbs had once threatened to tear. It was far from ideal, but she was grateful for the reduced aching- she was able to push it aside in favor of sitting up and taking note of any changes in her surroundings.

_ Thunk. _

Well, bumping her head on something was certainly new.

Suddenly excited- she had touched something, finally-she whipped her legs around and was met with an odd kind of chest. Despite not receiving any immediate source of light, it seemed to contain its own fragments of radiance trapped between deep blues and mixed greens. 

Below a golden latch sat what she now recognized as an Eye of Ender; Soren had studied the peculiar orbs once.

After placing a hand on the chest to confirm that she could in fact feel it, the clasp was tentatively undone so the lid could be raised. As it opened, the fresh scent of new leather wafted out from within.

There seemed to be nothing in the chest, save for a small book resting next to an ordinary quill.

Both were brought out at once, Ellegaard relishing the sensation of weight in her hands. Upon closer examination, the smooth leather cover had no engraved title like the books she was used to, and there seemed to be no indication that said book had even been used before.

Only when she tentatively opened it did she realize how wrong that assessment was.

The very top of the first page read, in dark ink:

**“Are you feeling better now?”**

It was all she could do to not hurl the blasted thing into next week.

Acutely aware of the feeling that she was being watched, Ellegaard frantically whipped her head around in a manner that agitated the barely-there pain. 

There had to be some place that she was being observed from, right?

Needless to say, it became clear after a couple of minutes that she had as much of a chance of finding the mysterious onlooker as she did figuring out this whole mess- so, cautiously, she returned her focus to the book, and let the aching in her ligaments begin to subside.

Just under the original phrase now sat a new one, reading:

**“I’m really not sure why you’re bothering to look. You won’t find me.”**

Enough was enough. 

Ellegaard picked up the quill- which was pleasantly solid between her fingertips- and scribbled a sentence back.

_ “Who are you?”  _ Frank, and straight to the point.

Almost instantly, as if she were watching someone else write, words began to appear soundlessly on the page.

**“It’s very rude to answer a question with another, you know.”**

Ah, so manners had become a thing now? She donned the quill again:

_ “And it is also very rude to begin a conversation without introducing oneself. Much less spy on them.” _

Words were manifesting again, leaving the smallest indents of a nib that wasn’t there.

**“My oh my.. It seems we’re both being rather impolite. Alright, alright- if you answer my question, I’ll answer yours.”**

For a brief moment, she considered an angry retort; she was in  _ this _ condition and they wanted to play games with her?

But as close as she was to giving this thing a piece of her mind, it probably wouldn’t be the  _ best _ idea to anger something that was watching her from a place she couldn’t see.

And, truth be told, Ellegaard didn’t even have the slightest clue of how the state she was in worked.

Gabriel, she recalled, had told her once in a training session that any environment she didn’t know like the “back of her own hand” put her at a disadvantage against any opponents.

He had said, while adjusting her grip on her sparring sword, that “when given the choice between making an ally or making an enemy,  _ always  _ choose ally. Someone always knows something you don’t. So would you rather have them on your side, or against?”

With the words of her long-lost friend echoing in her mind, she began to write again.

_ “To answer your question, I do think I’m feeling somewhat better. I suppose I could certainly be worse.” _

**“If you say so. Although you looked pretty distressed when you came back from the crater a while ago.”**

….How long had this someone been watching her? The thought wracked her body with chills.

**“And to answer your question- no need to shiver, really- I’m just somebody who’s nobody.”**

She groaned despite herself- it was incredibly hard to make allies when they decided to play coy.

Ellegaard began to write back again, looking for some form of further clarification. But whatever- or  _ whoever _ \- was writing to her seemed to have gone radio dead without a second thought. 

Sighing, she closed the book and set it back in the chest, which now seemed to glitter with even more of the rising sun’s rays. The quill was placed on top of the leather cover, and the chest was closed.

Glancing at her surroundings, Ellegaard remarked to herself that all of the monsters were gone now, either having suffered a burning death by sunlight or by retreating to whatever foul pit they had come from. Grasses and leaves danced alike in response to a light breeze that swept across the now illuminated grassland, imitating some semblance of peace- there were hardly any signs of the destruction that had once littered it.

It was truly remarkable, really; how had the Earth healed so quickly?

_ I suppose Mother Nature really does have the final say, _ she thought, turning her gaze back to the chest she had just closed.

...Or, at least, the spot where it was.

The chest was gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Halloween!! 😊  
> I was super excited to write this chapter, I've been sitting on the idea of the book for a couple months now!! Be free, book concept...  
> I hope the way I differentiated the writing was clear enough, but if not: italics in quotes is Ellegaard's writing, and bold in quotes are the manifesting words!! I'm still learning the magic of formatting! 😅  
> See you next chapter! 😊


	5. Star

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eyes to the sky.

_Everything has a logical and true explanation. Even if you can’t see it._

Even as she repeated this mantra to herself, walking slow circles around the oak stump, Ellegaard began to realize that nothing made _sense_ \- the chest disappearing was only the tip of the iceberg, and it left her with more questions than answers.

If she really had lost her life- by this very tree, nonetheless- how was she even here?

She had heard countless different stories of what came after life; some had spoken of nothing but warmth in a land free of worry, while others had described it as a temporary waiting period before a new beginning in a different life. Ellegaard herself had chosen not to give it too much thought; it wasn’t like anyone had ever come back to reveal the truth, and there were much more relevant dilemmas that required her attention.

But here she was now, unable to interact with anything save for a book that brought no answers, and grappling with a bleak reality as her entire being continued to ache. It felt like a punishment, really-

She stopped pacing. Was that it?

A weaker part of her wanted to know what she had done wrong- bitterly, she shut it down before it could grow into self-pity. Ellegaard knew full well what she had done, and helping keep a horrendous lie alive was something that she’d regret for as long as she was able to.

Foolishly, as she sat down, she realized that some part of her yearned for the concepts of afterlife she had heard of. How wonderful would it be to be taken somewhere eternally forgiving, forever warm, and far away from the mistakes of the world? Or even better, the chance to begin again as someone new- free to learn again, and to grow again.

She thought back to what she had witnessed in the crater- a small wisp had climbed into the sky that day, a telltale symbol of something passing on.

Had she done that too?

She shook her head and climbed to her feet. Sitting here and feeling sorry for herself wasn’t doing _anything_ , and it was clear that the chest wasn’t going to reappear anytime soon.

As she turned around to begin pacing again, brilliant beams of light suddenly stretched upwards into the heavens. They pierced the clouds, sending different colors of effulgence beyond the atmosphere and as far as her eyes could see. 

As her gaze came back down, she saw that the source seemed to be just beyond the farthest line of trees, and where she had seen the barely-there glow not too long ago.

Before she knew it, she had taken off running.

-

One of the positives about her current situation was that nothing in her plane of existence could hold her back. Ellegaard found herself darting between trees, her feet weightless and barely skimming the ground. It made traveling incredibly easy, and she reached the end of the dense forest in what had to be record time.

Peering between trunks and branches, she made out the outskirts of a growing settlement.

Had that been there before?

The light’s source became more visible the closer she came, surrounded by a horde of people just beginning to disperse. Within the crowd, she was able to pick out individual faces- some familiar, some not, but all energized with some form of excitement.

As she stood amongst them, soaking in their energy, she realized that some of these people were her very own Redstonians- rendering her unable to choose between longing and relief.

She settled for silent blessings as they all walked past her.

It was getting easier to see now, and as she continued to walk towards the crowd’s center she was met with a structure of sorts. What was this-?

_Oh._

Stepping around the corner of the structure revealed a cyan banner bearing the image of a piglet. Just above it read one word:

**‘Reuben.’**

Things were beginning to make more sense now. She closed her eyes for a brief moment, paying her respects quietly.

When she turned around, she felt her heart leap into her throat.

Her friends, they- Were _here?_

Just a little farther off, Gabriel and Magnus stood side by side, refusing to meet anyone’s eyes but each others’. Ellegaard darted over to them, heart pounding a heavy beat- they hadn’t been with the group in the cavity that day.

She faced Gabriel first out of pure shock- they had said he was lost to _It_ , hadn’t they?

Or maybe he was one of hundreds, consumed and absorbed into nothing but darkness- and later, emerging from the fallen mass with a stagger and an unspoken question.

The warrior certainly had an oddly uncharacteristic look about him- he still wore his trademark smile, but it seemed dimmer and more forced than she could recall. 

He was tired, too, with dark circles shadowing misty eyes, and his scuffed helmet did little to hide the way his brow knotted in contemplation. Posture remained upright, as was the norm for him- but there was more of a weariness about it, especially in the way his shoulders slumped.

She turned to look at Magnus.

It was normal for him to look a bit run down- his occupation rarely ever presented a break from it. But as opposed to _Before_ , when he wore himself with a confidence unparalleled, he looked… _Actually_ beaten.

Looking closer, Ellegaard realized his eyes were devoid of their usual fire, and his smirk (the Griefer Grin, she had once called it) was nowhere to be found. He gazed off at nothing in particular, fiddling with an unraveling hem on his gloves and digging the toe of his boot into the ground.

Who _were_ these people?

Others passed by the pair, each with different faces; some feigned nonchalance, while others quickly averted their eyes from the two. A few sent heated glares or a couple choice words, much to her dismay- and it was upon receiving these that her old friends turned away silently.

It wasn’t hard to guess what had been revealed; this was an image that had plagued her dreams time and time again.

_This- This isn’t fair,_ her mind screamed. _You shouldn’t have to do this alone, I should be taking this with you. I-_

Suddenly, as if by some unspoken agreement, Gabriel and Magnus both righted themselves. Without a single word, the two turned away from each other and began separate treks out of the settlement.

That was enough to shake Ellegaard out of her stupor. Jolts of aggravated pain coursed through her body as she ran after Gabriel first, arms outstretched despite knowing she couldn’t touch him.

A small group of people passed in front of her field of sight, and Gabriel was gone.

Whirling around, she barely made out the worn emerald hues of Magnus’s armor before he too vanished into the dispersing crowd.

_They won’t go far_ , she assured herself, though every fiber of her being knew that wasn’t true.

They would return to their separate corners of the world, and only when they were hidden away would they begin to mend what was broken.

Just like before.

Turning around again, she caught a flash of her armor; elevated on a platform stood Jesse, along with some of the others who she could now remember by name. The younger engineer- Olivia, that was it- spoke with the taller one in green that she remembered to be an “Axel”. The redheaded girl, who she believed to be the “Petra” she had heard of once, stood more towards the side, while Jesse spoke with-

_Ivor?_

She hurried over to the base of the stage, hardly believing her eyes. They all seemed to be doing much better, though not without their fair share of strain- Ivor especially.

She stared at him.

He looked right through her.

Ellegaard wasn’t entirely sure what she had been expecting to feel when she looked at him, but it wasn’t this.

She moved on.

A bit behind the group, glowing pillars of light cast faint glows of red, green, blue, and white onto the backs of the heroes- and as Ellegaard took a couple more steps forward, she was able to make out more of the contraption that produced them.

The multicolored rays had been arranged in the same formation as that of Gabriel’s amulet, but housing a purple beam in the middle; within the middle beam was a star, colored the deepest of violets. Its center housed a single pinnacle of a much more vivid purple, and the star itself seemed to twirl in a gentle swirling motion. Its movement held her gaze for perhaps longer than she had intended; there was no doubt that this was the source behind the lights that had led her here.

It was only when the last of the remaining people had retreated into their homes, and the heroes drew back into further celebration elsewhere, that Ellegaard finally turned away and began the journey back.

She had a lot of information to go over.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter hurt to write.. 😣 I'm so sorry, Ellie..  
> I'm super happy that I managed to get more content into this one though, I'm learning how much fun writing can be! 😊  
> I hope you enjoyed this (painful) chapter!! 😊


	6. Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Count carefully.

The walk back was… Difficult, to say the least.

Ellegaard had chosen to slow her speed this time around; there was no need to hurry, and plenty to mull over. The ground was silent beneath her feet, leaves refusing to stir and grass left undisturbed. Muted light filtered through the dense forest canopy, shining right through her and scattering the tiniest pinpoints of fading sunlight across the ground.

So, what did she know?

_It all started by the tree. I was badly hurt, and I fell asleep._

The whole concept of “asleep” was still up in the air, but it was something.

_And I can’t interact with anything or anyone, save for an oddly enigmatic book that writes back._

A familiar pang of hurt came with that thought. She pushed it aside.

_I hear whispers when I close my eyes for too long, and it makes me feel like I’m being torn apart._

Unconsciously, Ellegaard shuddered- the pain still lingered, and she was still entirely in the dark as to why. In fact, she was in the dark with this entire situation; everything felt like a blurred fever dream, or a hallucination that rapidly descended further into confusion with each passing day.

Her most recent trip seemed to have only amplified that, with the settlement that popped up out of nowhere- and the broken faces of those dear to her digging deep into her heart.

Were things really going to go back to the way they were before, with each of her old friends hiding from each other? Or would they slowly begin to erase all memories of each other from their minds as they went increasingly numb?

Ellegaard had silently ached for each of them when they went their separate ways.

She had been able to build a city of ingenuity and innovation from the ground up, and she had been able to craft machines far more intricate than anything she could have ever believed herself capable of.

But, she remarked, nothing she invented was anywhere near capable of bringing back Magnus’s barking guffaws after a victory, the clanking of armor that announced Gabriel’s arrival for breakfast after his morning training, the way Ivor muttered heated exclamations under his breath when one of them came back injured, or the steady melodies Soren--

_Soren._

Where was he?

He had been one of the last faces she had seen by the tree that day, but he was nowhere to be found in the town she had just been in. Did she just… Miss him entirely?

He had a way of making himself scarce when he was most needed, and of dropping off the map entirely. At least with the others she had a general idea of where she could find them, but with Soren?

For all she knew he could have fallen off the face of the Earth, and nobody would know any better.

-

By the time she made it out of the forest, the sky had become the deepest and darkest of indigoes while a sliver of a crescent moon climbed slowly into its place among the stars. It shone softly through the canopy of leaves overhead, sprinkling the ground below with pinpoints of gentle, drowsy moonlight. Distant rattlings and groans reverberated through the woodland behind her, signaling the return of otherworldly terrors and their nightly prowl.

And as Ellegaard neared the familiar stump, rubbing her throbbing ligatures, it was clear that they weren’t the only things that had come back.

Next to the jagged remains of the tree sat the same peculiar chest from before, its hues of green and blue masked in night. Despite being shrouded in darkness, though, the chest had seemingly found a new way to grab her attention- it was surrounded by the faintest particles of violet, so bright that they looked more along the lines of a pink.

Sure enough, the same book and quill rested inside when the chest was opened. She wasted no time in retrieving them, and even less opening the book. The first page contained only two words:

**“Welcome back.”**

This time, she knew exactly what she had to do. The quill was picked up, its single gentle feather bouncing slightly as she wrote a reply.

_“Thank you. I have a lot of questions.”_

The sudden appearance of seven more words interrupted her attempt to elaborate.

**“I can tell. You can ask four.”**

Ellegaard sighed in exasperation, and pressed her fingertips to her forehead.

_Can’t you just explain everything?_

It was a thought she had a feeling would be returning again, and soon. She glanced down at the book again, slowly moving her hand away from her temple.

**“No. You’re lucky I’m not counting that one.”**

_“Are you spying on my thoughts too, now?”_

**“Also no. But I can read your expressions, including the one you’ll be making when I tell you that was your first question.”**

_Curses_ , she thought. There was no room for any ridiculous mistakes, much less when she needed answers. She would have to play her next moves carefully.

Ellegaard twirled the feathered tip in the air for a couple moments before she placed it on the paper again, and began writing.

_“Well, since we’re on the topic of you, what can I call you?”_

**“I’ve never had or seen the need for a name. But then again, I’ve never interacted with someone who was so insistent on calling me something.”**

She hardly had a chance to even think about replying before more words appeared.

**“You may refer to me as Scribe. You have two more questions.”**

This would be tricky. Her quill began moving again.

_“Okay, Scribe. It’s very nice to meet you, although I’m guessing you probably know who I am by this point.”_

_A little more politeness couldn’t hurt_ , she mused. She continued her sentence.

_“Am I dead?”_

Ellegaard hadn’t realized how much she’d been dreading that question until she started to get an answer, her heart pounding in her chest as words began to materialize.

**“Not quite. But you’re not alive, either. You get one more question.”**

She shook her head. It was an answer that would have to do, at least for now. Scribe didn’t seem intent on providing much more of an explanation, and it was crucial that she get as many questions asked as she could; details could always be reconfirmed later.

Right now, Ellegaard needed to cover as many bases as she could.

_“If I’m in this state right now, where I can’t interact with anything- what’s causing all the pain I’m feeling?”_

It was strange to not see the reply begin to appear immediately; had this been a physical conversation, she suspected it would have been a brief hesitation before the other party continued. Just as she was considering repeating her query, though, Scribe seemed to snap back into focus.

**“It looks like you’ve met the** **_Hunt_ ** **.”**

Well, _that_ wasn’t comforting in the slightest.

_“What’s the Hunt?”_

**“You’re fresh out of questions.”**

Ellegaard angrily began the first pen stroke of what was to be a heated string of phrases- and found that despite her frustrated scribbling, nothing was appearing on the paper.

Apparently, Scribe had more control over their communication than she previously thought.

_Some ally_. 

She closed the book with a bitter, sharp maneuver, and placed it beside her as she leaned against the chest with a heavy sigh.

It looked like she was more on her own than she had hoped.

Miles behind her, the five beacons of light continued to pierce the midnight sky. In this moment, though, they seemed to be the only pillars keeping the heavens from caving in on her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Our mysterious writer finally has a name!! (And I've been so incredibly excited to write them, their dialogue has been stuck in my mind since August!! ☺️)  
> This chapter was a bit shorter than I wanted it to be, but thank you so much for checking this out!! I hope you're having as much fun reading this as I am writing it!! 😊


	7. Tag

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just a game.

Ellegaard wasn’t sure if it was just her own impatience, but waiting for the night to end felt like crawling through cobwebs.

She had placed the now silent book back in its chest, and the quill was laid on top hours ago- but the chest still remained, it’s exterior emanating a faint glow. Particles of vivid magenta drew closer, then danced away, then drew closer…

The occasional monster had passed by her setup many a time without so much as a second glance- and after the sixth occasion, she stopped flinching out of habit.

It was a scene that reminded her of her first night out here, and of the vicious cycle she seemed to be trapped in. Whenever she wasn’t out investigating some peculiar change in her environment, she was back at this very spot; either writing to Scribe, or getting lost in her own thoughts.

It was a routine she couldn’t help but deem pathetic. Here she was, the renowned  _ Redstone Engineer _ , reduced to nothing but a memory to the living and just short of dead.

Would Redstonia cast out all signs of her once the news of the truth spread to them?

Ellegaard absentmindedly pressed her hand into the ground, several blades of grass phasing through her palm.

It was probable. After all, hadn’t that been what the Order had done to each other? 

To Ivor?

She shook her head silently, heaving a sigh. He hadn’t deserved that, and they all knew it. Truthfully, he was probably the best of them all; heaven knows she certainly wasn’t in the clear.

Ellegaard thought back to what she had experienced in the small town that day, alive and full of celebration. She had walked up to Ivor, stared him in the eye even- and by all means, she should have at least felt  _ something _ she’d expect, like pain or anger.

Now that she could reflect, she realized that her own feelings had slipped into something far different than what she had expected:

Grief.

It took a form that was much different from the kind Jesse and their friends had experienced back in the crater; the one she grieved for still had breath in his lungs, and blood that ran warm through his veins.

Rather, it was the kind of grieving that mourned lost friendships, and wept over a warm future that would never come to be.

Knowing that she had helped contribute to Ivor’s growing desire for rectification, and had aided in contributing to the lie that drove her  _ family _ apart, was something that she could never forgive herself for.

Their greatest treasure had always been each other, even if none of them had ever said it outright- through all the adventures together, and the sudden catapult into fame, they had held each other dear in a way none of them could describe.

It was a fond feeling that they had all chosen to leave in the past, and it didn’t seem to show any signs of returning- or at least, not in the way it was before.

_ What if _ and  _ what could have been  _ were normally phrases she reserved only for her work, a thought process that allowed her to efficiently analyze the possible outcomes that could result from altering different components of a machine.

But, now that she thought about it, what made them any different?

If she could go back and alter one component- that one variable that caused the entire group to go astray- would things have turned out differently?

Would  _ any _ of this have happened?

It was a possibility that made her heart hurt.

Even the greatest of contraptions could be jeopardized by one misplaced repeater. But what made the Order different is that they were  _ people _ \- people with real feelings, and people who got  _ hurt _ . They would never be as easy of a fix as a simple rotation or adjustment, and Ellegaard knew it.

Before she could undoubtedly sink further into her introspection, a peculiar noise emanated from beside her- something between a high pitched shriek and a hoarse whisper.

What on  _ Earth _ made that kind of sound?

The source soon revealed itself, flitting across her field of sight in a blur of the palest blue. Wisps of a shimmering smoke trailed behind it in large swirls that curled in on themselves, eventually dispersing into the air around her.

By this point Ellegaard had climbed to her feet, brushing a strand of hair behind her ear and craning her neck to follow the new source of motion. Where had it gone?

She spun in wide circles, following the trail of smoke, until-

She was met with the smallest of faces, just larger than her palm. It seemed to have paused to hover directly in front of her, mouth spread in a twinkling smile and eyes paler than snow.

Attached to its face was a dainty figure covered in draping grey cloth, and in a miniscule hand was a sword of dull iron. From its back sprouted the most delicate, pale wings she had ever seen; they seemed incredibly fragile, to the point that Ellegaard was afraid her own breath would shatter them.

The thing- she had likened it to a sort of doll, now- seemed intent on keeping her attention, and let out a whisper of a giggle. One steady wingbeat was all it took for the tiny figure to rotate itself away from her; and after glancing over its shoulder to peer at her again, it darted off in a plume of swirling smoke.

...Did it want her to follow?

It only took half a second to launch into pursuit.

-

It was an odd feeling knowing that the wind blew through her when she ran, but chasing the winged creature provided a welcome distraction. In fact, it was a state that was similar to the one she entered upon closing her eyes- but instead of a crescendo of whispering, there was the steady beating of her heart as she bounded between obstacles and wove through trees.

There was certainly no shortage of tricks; she had just about caught up with the winged being before it plunged itself into the ground, seeming to phase directly through it.

Ellegaard had followed without a second thought, experiencing a sudden shock when she realized she  _ could. _ There was no time to balk, though; the creature was moving through solid stone as if it were air, and she would have to do the same if she wished to keep up.

Their game of tag led them through the deepest of ravines, ores glinting in the being’s faint glow, and into a complex of caves that carved a knotted network into the Earth. 

Over the undead that staggered through the tunnels, under the arachnids that clung to the ceiling- and at one point, directly through a dense layer of nothing but andesite.

She had no idea how long they continued the chase below ground, but the creature she followed seemed to have had enough of this environment. They had just reached an expanse of lava when it shot up suddenly, propelling itself through layers of thick stone overhead with Ellegaard not far behind.

Ore turned to stone, then to dirt… And finally, to-

Sunlight?

A small part of her mind took notice of the now illuminated terrain, a stark difference from how dark it had been when she dove down earlier- and as she continued to chase the lithe winged being, it was the same part that realized none of her surroundings were recognizable.

Whatever she was chasing didn’t seem to take notice of her wariness, instead choosing to increase its speed.

She adjusted hers accordingly.

They were in a forest she had never encountered before now- but it was near impossible to make out anything from the way the trees blurred. It wasn’t like it mattered, though; all her focus remained on the light beating of wings just ahead.

Ellegaard had been steadily closing the gap between them, and could now make out every intricate stitch in the grey cloth in front of her. If she stretched her arm out, she would be able to graze it with her fingertips.

Her heart raced with invigoration.

This was freedom.

This was victory.

This was-

Painful?

Her form suddenly contracted in on itself, causing her to cry out in agony as she tumbled to the ground. She frantically grabbed at her shoulders, her middle, her neck-  _ anything _ that would make it stop. Eyes prickled with tears, barely registering the now dissipating trail of smoke and the fading sound of gentle wingbeats.

She went into a frenzied panic, writhing about in agony and gasping for air- there seemed to be no end in sight to whatever had seized her, and stars were beginning to dance behind her vision as her heart beat erratically.

Ellegaard had begun to think that she was dying a second time when her suffering saw a sudden exponential drop- and her mind, only able to focus on replicating whatever action was behind that, told her to continue moving about.

Whatever form of wriggling she was doing was taking her back in the direction she had come from, albeit slowly. Still, as she gradually moved away from where she was heading, her limbs began to release themselves from the painful state of locking they had been in only moments ago- allowing her gasps to become less frequent as her lungs filled with precious air.

By the time she could make out the edge of the forest she was in, Ellegaard had been able to reposition herself into a crawling pose. She moved steadily towards the last couple of trees, relishing the loosening of her ligaments and the fading buzzing in the back of her brain.

After a couple more minutes of gradual movement, she had reached the last of the trees. These ones were bathed in sunlight, which provided a welcome contrast from what she now realized was the monochromatic appearance of the woods.

All it took was a quick rotation for her to lay on her back, and Ellegaard was more than happy to do so. The bright blue sky greeted her with expansive stretches of hazy clouds; and had she been able to feel the sun, she knew it would have sent a delightful warmth across her face.

She took the largest breath she could muster, and stretched her hands towards the heavens.

_ This  _ was freedom.

_ This _ was victory.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter took a bit longer to edit, but we're finally here!! ☺️  
> I wonder what the little creature is...  
> (I hope this was easy to read!! If I can make anything better, absolutely feel free to let me know!! 😊)


	8. Learn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Look closely. Listen carefully.

After reaching the edge of the forest, Ellegaard had laid on her back for a good while. She would watch the sun climb higher into the sky to eventually sit on its throne of noon, and it was only after it had reached that point that she would decide to sit up.

The pain from before had dulled to a persistent tingling, accompanied by a barely-there buzzing in the back of her mind; as she pushed herself upwards, though, both symptoms were interrupted by a-

_Thunk._

...Oh, not _again_.

Scribe had already been far from helpful, and she wasn’t sure she could deal with their teasing after what she had just experienced- much less with the necessary amount of patience.

Still, despite her frustration, she positioned herself to face the same glowing chest that had appeared twice before. The bright particles that had surrounded it before were still present, but they had a more erratic motion to them today- it was like watching a hunter’s prey tense before the telltale arrow was fired.

She hadn’t opened the chest with any particular form of urgency, and the contents remained the same as all the other times she had peered inside; so donning the quill, she opened the blank cover.

**“We really must stop meeting like this.”**

_“Hello, Scribe. Will I be getting more answers today?”_

**“If you’re not careful, you may not be around to receive them.”**

Ellegaard quirked an eyebrow in confusion. It would be in poor taste for someone so concerned with manners to threaten her, especially with all the effort she had previously made to be polite.

Now that she was noticing the discrepancies, a startling realization suddenly came to her- if Scribe was proving to be this volatile, could she really trust them to give her the answers she needed?

It was a question that would carve a place for itself in her mind, but she ultimately decided she couldn’t go wrong with a little more probing.

_“I’d really appreciate a little more elaboration.”_

**“The being you chased had intentions far from good. Vex are dangerous creatures, and they mean you nothing but harm.”**

Ellegaard shuddered, cheeks burning with shame.

She was supposed to be one of the brightest minds the world had ever seen- had she really let herself be swayed by something she knew nothing about? What would have happened if she had allowed herself to follow it further?

When had she become so _foolish_?

_“That’s good to know.”_

**“You’re very welcome.”**

Scribe’s words had filled up the last bit of space on the current page, so they were both forced onto the next available one. Upon turning over to it, Ellegaard found that Scribe had continued their sentence:

**“Take a good, long look at those trees in front of you.”**

Confusing as it was, Ellegaard obeyed and lifted her gaze from the book. Seeing as it was a bit difficult to make out individual details, she eventually stood and took a couple steps closer to the forest she had come from.

As she steadily drew closer, the buzzing in her mind slowly began to intensify- and the trees _did_ have an odd look about them. There was something about the tall figures that was almost skeletal, especially in the way their colorless branches seemed to stretch their spindly limbs towards the sky. 

There were smaller, more faded spots arranged on the narrow trunk that she would have to move closer to make out- but the closer to the trees she got, the harder it was becoming to concentrate. Even still, they were oddly familiar; just _incredibly_ difficult to place.

Ellegaard had just about walked through the tree when she suddenly realized two important conclusions:

One, she became more physically uncomfortable with every step into this wretched place.

And two, the arrangement of the tree spots bore individual faces of agony, with mouths stretched in horror and deep hollows for eyes. 

She had only been able to recognize the pattern because of its striking similarity to soul sand.

The cover of the book was immediately thrown open, with Ellegaard stumbling backwards and grasping for her quill.

**“You figured it out, I presume?”**

_“I did. This forest- it’s far from normal, isn’t it?”_

**“Furthest thing. If you** **ever** **see those trees again, I suggest you distance yourself as quickly as possible. And as I’m sure you’ve learned, your form doesn’t exactly respond well to being near here- so I’d recommend that you begin walking back.”**

Scribe had barely finished their sentence before Ellegaard began to write again, her handwriting lengthening in energized swoops of realization.

_“So that means the thing- the Vex, you said- was trying to lead me here because it knew this environment causes me harm. And it must have known that, so there has to be a motive... Well, unless this is a being that takes some kind of pleasure in causing pain for no reason, but that hardly seems logica-”_

Scribe’s next words appeared directly after her unfinished sentence, effectively preventing her from continuing.

**“You can theorize all you want on the way back to your stump. Let’s go.”**

_“What about-”_

**“Don’t worry about the chest. It’ll be waiting for you when you make it back.”**

And as Ellegaard turned her head to do one last once-over of the area, she found that the deeply hued receptacle had already vanished accordingly.

It would just be her and Scribe.

-

She had started off in the only direction she could remember, with the book open and nestled in the crook of her arm. The quill was tucked behind her ear, its sole feather intertwining with the dark strands of her hair as she walked.

It was (admittedly) very clear that Scribe knew a _lot_ more than she did on whatever was happening. Ellegaard liked to believe herself a vast bank of knowledge on her best days, but even she knew that knowledge alone wasn’t what her profession was solely about.

When she had just started out, (it felt like so long ago, now), she was desperate to learn anything and everything. She had always seen herself in a competition with every other engineer she came across, silently comparing everything she knew against their knowledge and studying vigorously if they had more than she.

It was a fire she didn’t particularly enjoy having, but it was there; the desire to learn what hadn’t been learnt, and to implement what hadn’t yet been discovered, was one of her strongest inner forces. It was what fueled her yearning for greatness, what propelled her into the lab every day- and what kept her up long after the sun had set.

She read a book- its title had long escaped her memory- during one particularly long night, searching for some morsel of information she hadn’t yet consumed, when she came across a peculiar passage:

‘ _Engineering, dearest reader, is never about how much you know. That wouldn’t be fair- we all know different things, and we all have different experiences. Rather, what separates a good engineer from a great engineer is how they adapt- because at our core, that’s all we’re made to do. We will always adapt our knowledge into bigger and better vessels, and we will always evolve into more polished versions of ourselves. This is our art.”_

Ellegaard’s entire outlook had changed drastically after stumbling across the hidden words of wisdom; she had been able to teach herself to absorb information instead of simply reading it, and it showed. Her most exponential period of growth had been during that time, and she had felt _unstoppable_.

That wasn’t to say her competitive streak hadn’t prevailed in future instances, though- and as she continued to compare different fragments of her past to each other, she began to realize that perhaps she had… Strayed a bit further than she would have liked.

Lies affected more than the things around her, it seemed.

Perhaps it was time to learn again.

Scribe had been largely silent so far, so Ellegaard hadn’t been expecting to see a sentence waiting for her when she glanced down to where the book was resting.

**“The past certainly is a beast, hm?”**

She had plucked the quill from behind her ear as soon as she laid her eyes on the phrase; now seemed like as good a time as any to get more information out of them, and it could be used to perhaps find out more about Scribe themself.

_“Absolutely. But I thought you said you couldn’t read my thoughts?”_

**“Like I said before, all I can read are your expressions. You do have a certain look when you’re reminiscing, though.”**

_“I have to say, I don’t think that made me feel any particular sense of privacy.”_

**“If it’s any consolation, everyone has their own ‘Thinking Look’. When you reach this birch tree up here, turn right and keep walking.”**

Ellegaard glanced up from her writing and noticed that there was, in fact, a smaller birch tree just ahead. Silently thankful for the directions, (as she was beginning to forget the direction from whence she came), she turned as instructed and continued walking.

_“Does that mean you watch others, too?”_

There was a momentary pause before Scribe’s reply, and Ellegaard thought it just long enough for someone to chuckle briefly had the conversation been in person.

**“I keep watch on everyone who’s ever come into existence.”**

_Oh, my._

It was becoming increasingly clear that Scribe was a force larger than she.

_“Any specific reason?”_

**“You can’t record all of history by only watching one person, now can you?”**

_“...So you’re history’s scribe, hence your name.”_

**“Correct.”**

It was at this point that her natural curiosity began to make itself known again. The possibilities, the experiences… They were nearly overwhelming. She began to write back with an energetic scrawl, the feathered end of the quill shaking back and forth.

_“How do you record history?”_

**“In books, much like the one you’re writing in now.”**

_“How many books have you filled?”_

**“Far too many for the number to fit on this page.”**

_“How far back do they go?”_

**“To a time eons before you. Follow this upcoming river.”**

Ellegaard looked up from the book again to make sure she was on the right track, and shifted her course to walk right alongside the moving body of water. It was difficult to keep herself from filling the entire book with excited queries, but it was crucial that she focus on her current situation before she found herself in another unfavorable situation.

_“Scribe. Where am I right now?”_

**“Right next to the river.”**

_“Oh, no- I mean this dimension I’m in, where I can’t interact with anything. It certainly can’t just be me, right?”_

**“You’re correct. Your current plane of existence is the Between- it sits on the silver thread that separates Life and Death, making all that exist within into spectres.”**

_“So, like the Vex.”_

**“Yes.”**

_“And what do the spectres do?”_

**“Watch. And wait.”**

Ellegaard lightly tapped the quill’s feather against her chin. There was something else Scribe had mentioned before.

_“You told me about something called the Hunt a little while ago. Is it in the Between too?”_

**“The realm of Between itself belongs to the** **_Hunt_ ** **. Everything else is merely prey.”**

It was a notion more ominous than she would have liked, and one that sent her on edge. She continued walking, lips set in a firm line and eyes focused on the path ahead.

The surrounding environment had been getting more and more familiar with each weightless footstep, and Ellegaard was astonished to see just how far the Vex had led her. Throwing caution to the wind was something she usually considered uncharacteristic for herself, (that was Magnus’s job, anyway), so the fact that she had let herself be pulled so far away was slightly unsettling.

For the time being, though, she was more inclined to trust Scribe than she was before her impromptu journey- which certainly had to count for something. And as the familiar stump she had started by began to come more and more into focus, (with the chest glinting next to it as promised), Ellegaard decided that she’d take whatever progress she could get.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things are only just beginning to fit together, and I could hardly wait to post this!! ☺️☺️ I was definitely a bit sleepy while I typed this out, but I think I caught most of the silly little mistakes I made!!  
> I hope you enjoyed this chapter!! 😊


	9. Storm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oh, what to do in a thunderstorm?

After resituating herself, Ellegaard spent the majority of what little daylight remained absorbing and reformatting all of the new information she had learned.

She would have liked to bring forward more of her queries had Scribe decided to stick around, especially concerning the  _ Hunt _ . But the moment she had arrived within arm’s distance of the chest, they had decided to go silent once again. The chest had disappeared again after she replaced the book and quill, so it appeared that they considered her arrival to be a sufficient reason for the conversation to end.

Despite that, Ellegaard decided that she would form a more concrete plan of action- combining what she had learned with a little experimentation of her own.

Although still disturbed by her previous journey with the Vex, it certainly had its positives: she had been able to push herself to new limits, and discovered what she was (and wasn’t) capable of doing in her condition. After she made it back to the remnants of the oak tree, she had spent the rest of the day trying to phase into the ground as she had done before.

The sun had already sunk far below the horizon when she decided that it would take a bit longer than anticipated to replicate what she was trying to do- so she settled for assuming her ordinary position at the base of the stump.

Tonight stood out when compared to the previous nightfalls she had sat through. The sky was low and dark with heavy stratus clouds that resembled an angry sea, blocking out any moonlight that attempted to penetrate the thick mass. The winds had slowly begun to increase in their vigor, and anything not attached to something else was beginning to shift in the rising gales.

The surrounding air resounded with a deep clap of thunder from miles away as the clouds themselves began to give in, releasing the first drops of what would become torrential downpour. The sky’s aggrieved tears were swept to and fro in the howling gales of night, while distant booming crept closer and sent crackling slices of light through the shattered sky.

Had things been normal, Ellegaard would have felt the need to take shelter somewhere dry and warm; it was a violent storm that would no doubt wreak some form of havoc. But she had recently found herself reacting less to things she normally would- so tonight, she sat with her chin on her knees and watched the rain pour down.

She had found herself slipping into the past whenever she had down time, (which seemed to be getting more frequent), with all of its memories and mistakes. And, truth be told, she wasn’t entirely sure why- there was nothing she could change, and it was foolish to hope so.

Still, she supposed, looking back brought some semblance of assurance. If she concentrated enough, she could pretend that things were alright- and if that was the only thing keeping her sane in this warped form of existence, then she’d gladly take sanctuary in her own mind.

When she wasn’t looking to the past, she would stay in the present; all new morsels of information would be processed as learned, then linked to things she had already known. But out of all the time she had been here already, (Days? Weeks?), she hadn’t  _ once _ looked towards the future.

What would happen if she were in the  _ Between  _ for all of eternity, doomed to nothing but intermittent agony and limited conversation?

Was there any chance of her getting out?

The storm had only seemed to increase in its intensity, rain now beating against the Earth with deafening ferocity. Trees nearby had begun to bow in submission to the strength of the winds, with leaves and branches tearing apart to tumble across soaked terrain. A particular flash of lightning struck an unfortunate oak tree just a couple feet away, so blinding that Ellegaard was forced to shield her eyes from the display.

The tree had ignited instantly, hungry flames engulfing the wood and casting a glow through the torrential downpour. Ellegaard hazily watched as the blaze swallowed the tree with astounding speed, blinking every now and then against the light.

It was possible for lightning to strike everything that stood tall- it had a way of bringing the highest structures to their knees in a single well-placed strike. That was one of the good things about staying close to the ground during a storm: the lowest objects, already fallen, made the most difficult prey- especially with much easier targets nearby.

Ellegaard and the oak stump would remain untouched through the rest of the night.

-

Ivor had never considered himself a daytime person by any means.

Darkness had a way of hiding things nobody wanted revealed, and of giving a home to those who preferred not to be known.

He had spent nearly every night he could last remember in a state of meandering, roaming from here to there and back again. Seasons were nothing but a change in scenery for him- when he grew weary enough of one setting, he would find some other beaten path to traverse along.

And traverse he did.

For months he had been gathering small pieces from everywhere he had been, fitting a jigsaw puzzle together with everything he collected. A meal was traded for an emerald, which was traded for a weapon, and so on… It was only when he had gotten ahold of the first wither skull that he finally began to understand what the puzzle would form.

He had done nothing but clamber for the remaining pieces after that, pressure rising with every footstep on a run down road. It had felt like holding his breath for weeks, and in a way he supposed he was.

Endercon had been the culmination of everything.

All he had needed was that final piece to put the puzzle together, to make everything  _ right _ again. He had thought that it would make him feel weightless, free even- and Ivor had scrambled to put it all together with an urgency he had been maintaining for months.

He was going to  _ breathe _ again, and he was sure of it.

But when it had all come together, the puzzle had looked different than he imagined it. Chaos had flown around him that day, and he still couldn’t breathe. Even as he had fled in a desperate attempt to save his own life, he had only felt heavier- and he couldn’t understand why.

Ivor had spent the next couple of days trying to force the puzzle to fit in the way he wanted, with each new method yielding nothing but failure. By that point a group had assembled, slowly picking apart the different pieces and leaving him… Empty.

He had no choice but to let them take control; and as they began to progress further, Ivor noticed that they seemed to be putting the pieces together on their own. Jesse and their group certainly made more progress than he ever would- and when everything reached a climax, they had even seen the full picture he had wanted to reveal for so long.

Even then, he hadn’t felt weightless like he had wanted to- all he had felt was a sense of urgency to just  _ end _ it.

(It was that point that he realized how much he wanted this all to be  _ over. _ )

Soren fleeing in the same way he once had changed nothing. His first instinct had been to chase him, and Ivor had done just that.

And only when it was all said and done did he begin to feel his shoulders loosen, and began to see the puzzle for what it really was.

Maybe that was why he was standing next to a beaten path in the middle of a violent storm, his feet unable to move despite his desire to run again.

Chaos cycloned around him, the wind whipping at his robes and sending strands of hair into a frenzy about his face. The ghosts of the dead past flew about him as he let the torrential downpour soak him through, arms stretched in a silent plea to the roaring sky.

With tears streaming down his rain drenched cheeks, Ivor whispered a silent apology to the ones who could no longer hear him.

-

Morning brought a blanket of calm to a clear sky, golden sunlight glinting off resting raindrops and puddles that had accumulated throughout the night. The destruction wrought by the storm sat at a quiet standstill, and a pile of charred ash replaced a tree that once stood just a couple feet away.

Fallen leaves and branches were strewn across the plains, resembling the way a child might leave their broken toys upon being called away. Strangely enough, the morning seemed to also bring a couple daring creatures into view; further off, a horse and her foal grazed on rain-soaked grass while a lone cow wandered.

For Ellegaard, the rising sun also brought light to her newly formulated plan.

As the storm was beating against the Earth, she had decided that the best thing she could do would be to locate  _ someone _ . It was all that she could really focus on for the moment- and even if there was no way that she could communicate with them, there was always the chance that her  _ someone _ would at least be able to sense her presence.

She had climbed to her feet the moment the first rays of sunlight streaked over the horizon, swept loose strands of hair behind her ear, and turned to face the forever-glowing beacons of the distant settlement. After a quick glance around her surroundings- still illuminated by a warm glow- she was off, effortlessly breaking into a jog towards the small town.

Though she had originally wanted to wait for Scribe so she could receive more guidance, Ellegaard decided that they were more than capable of finding her whenever they deemed it necessary. They had already made it especially clear that they would make contact on their own terms, rather than hers- and as much as she despised not having a (semi-reliable) indicator of danger, this plan would work best with her at the helm.

The trip was a quick one, today- she had ditched her usual method of avoiding the trees, instead deciding to run straight through them. As much as Ellegaard disliked the… reminder, she needed to arrive at the settlement early enough to catch the morning conversations amongst the town members.

If she listened diligently enough, she just might be able to learn where her friends had run off to. (Even if it was more of a silent hope.)

Upon breaching the last line of trees, she was met with a sign just above a newly constructed gate, reading:

**‘Welcome to Beacontown.”**

She had to admit, it was a fitting name- and it would be easier for her to refer to it by that.

Luckily for Ellegaard, she arrived just as the people of Beacontown were beginning to go about their morning activities. Most had grouped into small congregations outside of nearby shops, sharing opinions and gossip amongst each other and watching the sun rise.

As much as she detested eavesdropping, this was her only chance to get the information she needed. The longer she waited, the less prevalent the desired topic would be.

It was difficult to decide who to listen in on first, but she ultimately settled on a small group closest to her. She neared the steps they sat on, zeroing her focus in on their voices alone as she caught the middle part of a sentence.

“...they had a shipment that was supposed to be sent yesterday, too, so I’m just hoping I can get all the slabs out before the end of the week.”

The group nodded in unison, seemingly sharing the same sentiment.

A woman with silver hair that curled upwards at the edges spoke up next.

“Let me tell you, things are only going to get crazier as more and more people move in here. I mean, I got a whopping twenty three orders for rye alone! Business is absolutely  _ booming _ now that more people need supplies to get on their feet.”

The group continued to discuss their own happenings for several long minutes. Ellegaard was half considering moving on to another conversation when the words of a magenta-haired woman caught her attention:

“With Beacontown growing so quickly, I’m not surprised that  _ they _ upped and left. Gotta be somewhat embarrassing to have all these people slowly learning the truth.”

_ Well, where did ‘they’ go?  _

She found herself slowly growing anxious with the lack of elaboration- surely her friends hadn’t become  _ that _ taboo, right?

The silver haired woman nodded, shifting her weight to her left foot. “Mhm. Honestly, I’m kinda hoping the New Order can avoid that- did you hear about them leaving today? Apparently they’re supposed to be heading to some desert…”

It didn’t take her long to figure out who the “New Order” was- based on who had taken the stage during her last visit to Beacontown, it had to be composed of Jesse and their troupe. Her heart fluttered with an odd form of anxiety for them.

Ellegaard kept listening until the small group eventually split up, each member heading off with a cheerful wave to begin business as usual. Before she could find another conversation to listen in on, however, nearby townsfolk suddenly turned towards the center of the settlement and erupted in a storm of cheers.

It was slightly disorienting to whirl around so quickly, but it didn’t disappoint: from the heart of the town emerged the New Order of the Stone, armor gleaming and faces aglow with determination as they marched past the boisterous crowd and towards the gates.

They all carried themselves with an air of excited heroism, something she hadn’t seen since her days with her own team. As they drew closer to her own spot, she remarked that they had all grown into themselves quite nicely:

Axel had clearly thrived in his own instruction, wearing a helmet that struck her as strangely familiar. He had a glint in his eyes, so powerful that she almost felt the need to turn away. He stood close to his friends, towering over them in a manner that suggested any attacks against them would be quickly met with an explosive retaliation.

The Petra girl had gained her own upgrades as well, sporting an intricately detailed set of cerulean armor with gold trim. A sheathed sword swung at her left hip, letting out a jovial clanking sound with every step- and the confidence behind her smile was unmistakable.

Ellegaard was flooded with a sense of unjustified pride when she laid her eyes on Olivia. The young engineer wore a set of armor that was simple enough to protect her without any issues, but classy enough to reflect her profession. While she had been more uneasy upon Ellegaard’s earlier encounters with her, Olivia had quickly come into her own- and every step she now took was more of an assertion than a question.

_ And, _ a small voice couldn’t help but say,  _ she became this in spite of you. _

So it was with a guilty heart that she looked over to Jesse, who led the charge- something was different about them, but it was difficult to place.

They had clearly gained confidence in themself as well, of course- but that couldn’t be it.

Same face… Same walk… Same-

_ Ah. _

It was only when the New Order of the Stone reached the gates, turning around to acknowledge the thunderous applause, that Ellegaard realized Jesse wore a new set of armor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're going places now!!  
> It took a bit to get the train moving on this chapter, but it felt so so good to finish and even better to add that little bit of Ivor's perspective!! ☺️  
> This one was also a bit longer than I originally thought it would be, so I hope this funky little group of words was at least easy to read!! 😊 See you next chapter!


	10. Heartbeat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A lot can be said with a single throb of the heart.

It had taken Ellegaard a couple seconds to get over her initial shock towards the armor realization, and even longer to begin throwing explanations together.

Perhaps Jesse had simply seen the need for a new set? 

She shook her head. Hers could have simply taken too much damage, and left them with no choice. It certainly wouldn’t be beneficial to wear the same old set of armor on new journeys, especially when said armor posed a liability to their safety.

Although, now that the truth about the Order was out…

Ellegaard furrowed her brows.

It wouldn’t surprise her if her own set had too much of a bad name attached to it.

Would they have cast it away, into a dark corner where it could gather dust and-

_ That’s enough. _

Despite her own fears, it was time to bury that train of thought. She could work through whatever emotional amalgamation she had just experienced when her feet were back on  _ solid _ ground.

But, for now, Ellegaard needed to refocus on her next course of action.

She  _ could _ try to follow the New Order through their next adventure, and hope that she’d discover some form of communication to make them aware of her. Perhaps they’d even get ahold of a treasure that she could interact with, or encounter someone that would be able to see her..

A sudden pang of guilt brought that train of thought to a screeching halt.

Expeditions and adventures were dangerous enough without a half-dead engineer attempting to make contact- and it wouldn’t be fair to do that to them.

She was a figment of the past, a retired memory that was best only spoken about. To put more on their plates and ask them to help her, (who was partially responsible for their previous call to action), would be drastically unjust of her.

Ellegaard turned away as the New Order stepped past the gates. She wouldn’t impede their travels, but she could silently send her blessings for a safe journey.

The now densely packed crowd, satisfied that they had seen off their heroes, steadily began to disperse into the rest of the town. 

Shop owners began to set out their products for the public eye, and the resident farmers (clad in overalls dotted with grass stains) began their trek out into the fields. Those who were without a specific occupation wandered from stand to stand, inspecting handiwork and occasionally making a purchase with dazzling green emeralds.

It was evident that there wouldn’t be any more of the conversations she needed to hear, much less while the majority of Beacontown was at work. So she moved swiftly through the carefully planned streets, pausing every now and then to take a closer look at something she deemed interesting enough to be of some use.

A merchant’s silver bottle filled with a viscous swirling fluid had seemed promising enough, and she had hoped that she would be able to disturb it enough to catch someone’s attention. But, just like her other attempts, she had found herself grasping at nothing but air- and she had moved onto the next potential tool with a heavy sigh.

Even with all the disappointments, it was remarkably easy for her to get caught up in the buzz of activity. There were so many people around her, each on their own separate missions, and the city was a beating heart in that regard. Every single occupant was what kept the heartbeat alive, and what kept Beacontown humming with life.

The maturing sun’s rays bathed newly constructed rooftops and streets with warmth as she wove further into the quickly growing settlement.

Truthfully, though, she wasn’t sure if she could even call it that anymore- Becaontown had clearly grown since the ceremony, both in size and population. Whereas there had only been about thirty people during her last visit, that number seemed to have tripled with no intent of slowing down.

It was a number much more staggering than Ellegaard was used to. In Redstonia, the population had been just enough for her to be able to remember individual names and faces without the city feeling too empty. Beacontown, however, seemed to have a plethora of new people with every street she turned onto.

_ There’s certainly no lack of excitement here, _ she mused.  _ Scribe must be up to their shoulders in happenings to write down. _

As she continued, she decided that what fascinated her the most was how each separate structure was so different from the one next to it. Someone had built a large rendition of a feline next to a house crafted solely out of bright pink materials, and nobody seemed to pay it any mind. It put her in mind of the way one might examine a mosaic..

Wandering closer towards the edge of the town, (past the beginnings of a skull-shaped cobblestone structure with an empty moat at its base), Ellegaard was stopped in her tracks by a peculiar building.

It was certainly a grand one, made of gleaming quartz and dried clay. It looked to be relatively new, too- given the texture of the clay, it couldn’t have been more than a couple days after it was completed. Just above the entrance sat a great spike made from the most brilliant gold she had ever seen, shooting upwards for a considerably high distance and gleaming with the rising sun’s rays.

Ellegaard paused her stroll, twisting a tendril of hair around her finger.

Given the splendor of the structure, it was more than likely that it had been built for a special purpose- and anything she could learn about Beacontown would be better than her current level of knowledge. As she approached, she took notice of a small sign just outside the entrance reading:

**‘The Order Hall’**

After gathering herself together and sparing one final glance to the streets of Beacontown, she trekked through the broad quartz entrance.

-

In Ellegaard’s opinion, the inside of the Order Hall was even more magnificent than the outside.

The space itself was broad, dark pillars of obsidian beginning at a clean quartz floor and holding up an intricately grand ceiling. Lofty windows on both sides of the hall let in an ethereal glow and gave the entire hall a feeling of tranquility. A long stretch of velvet-red carpet ran straight through an arrangement of gold platforms, and led to a short set of stairs that introduced a smaller group of the podiums.

Just above the carpet trail’s end was a hanging replica of the Order’s Amulet, facing downwards with each color arranged in its ordinary formation and illuminated by soft glowstone lamplight. 

(Seeing it as such a treasured part of the interior brought Ellegaard a sense of unexplainable solace.)

At the end of the hall was a vast space of nothing but air, spanning the entire width of the grand corridor and overlooking a range of jagged hills in the distance. 

It was already easy to determine that there was a significance unparalleled here. But as Ellegaard began to walk down the crimson carpet, still in awe of the grandeur that surrounded her, she was able to make out more of the individualities that made the Order Hall such a key part of Beacontown.

Some of the gleaming aurelian platforms she passed held a form of treasure, or a special item that reflected its own story. Some objects she recognized as prizes from her old expeditions with  _ her _ friends- such as a sea lantern they had nearly drowned to get ahold of, or a gold nugget from their first trip to the Nether.

(It had been a long time since she had last laid eyes upon them. Had  _ Ivor _ brought them here?)

The rest of the illuminated podiums were empty, however, and Ellegaard immediately realized that this was intentional. As the New Order continued to build their legacy, they would bring back whatever their journeys yielded- and they would gradually begin to fill the hall with their own treasures.

Ellegaard paused her analysis, and glanced downwards.

Her feet were at the top of the small flight of stairs, her form barely afloat upon the solid quartz .

...What had she done to accomplish this, again?

The situation felt nothing short of delicate, and it felt like she would slip through the platform at any moment- but as she turned to climb the adjacent two steps, she found the sensation to be remarkably similar to the way she roamed the solid Earth.

As long as she kept her mind off of what she stood on, her being  _ seemed _ to accept it as solid. It was a long way from hearing the reverberations of her own footsteps, or the gritty sensation of kicking up dirt as she walked- but it meant that she could access things she previously couldn’t.

So, the simple action of walking to the base of the sweeping window brought a surge of immense pride towards her newfound discovery- and upon arriving at her destination, she was able to peer out the massive space in the wall.

Ellegaard found that the view was well worth her journey over here. Beams of sun slipped through the gaps in bountiful stretches of milky-white clouds, spotting the distant rocky hills with bits of light and shadow. The breeze, although gentle in its caress of the Earth, carried the dense plumes of white into a distant somewhere while cream colored flowers bowed their soft buds to the ground.

It was a sight that struck certain chords within her memory, although not specifically from this angle. 

Perhaps she had traveled through there once…?

No, that couldn’t be it- those hills were too familiar for her to have only passed by once.

All she could remember was that it was normal for her to pass through a small divide between two of the rocky prominences, and just beyond that would be-

_ The Temple. _

Her heart leapt in recognition.

She had traversed through these hills with the Order to get to their shared temple, of  _ course _ -

Ellegaard began to shake her hands with excitement. Visiting their old home could yield something that would lead her to the rest of her friends, or at the very least something that would be of more use.

...Maybe they had even briefly visited, and she’d be able to find a clue as to where they had run off to.

She tore her focus away from the scenic overview and flew down the stairs, hardly caring when her boots phased through the final two steps.

The heart of Beacontown had given her something to grab on to, after all.

She would hold on to this lifeline with everything she had.

-

As Ellegaard made her way out of Beacontown, her back to the Order Hall and the noon sun, a certain forgotten amulet chose that exact moment to spring to life.

The old relic, yet to be reprogrammed to accommodate its new muses, began to pulse with a steady  _ ba-thump, ba-thump... _

A singular red stone emanated a silent plea for  _ anyone’s  _ attention, reaching its arms towards nothing but the numbing silence of the hall.

The left leg of the weary amulet would continue to sound its silent heartbeat for a couple minutes, casting a burdened glow down onto its podium and the floor under it. 

The cry for help went unheard to all but two, one of them hiding down below.

The one reached up, and it  _ squeezed. _

Then, with an agonized palpitation of a  _ thump _ , the red jewel let out its final straggling breath and fell into eternal silence once more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After many, many arduous years of editing... (Okay, a couple days...) I bring you chapter 10!! 😊 I can't believe we've made it this far!!  
> This one was a bit choppier at first, so it took a couple long rereads to smooth it out the rough edges and even more to polish it!  
> As tough as it was to get this one to where I wanted, I can at least say I've gotten better with editing! ☺️ See you next chapter!!


	11. Sound

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Watch for silence; listen for noise.

Ellegaard had gotten about two steps out of Beacontown’s gates when she nearly stumbled over a certain deeply hued receptacle.

Scribe had decided to pay her a visit.

After catching herself, she briefly gazed at the offending object. The minuscule flecks of magenta were just as sporadic as she remembered them to be, scrambling around the chest as if they were being chased- and while they continued their erratic dance, the eye of ender emanated with a reflection of the sun’s beams.The case itself sat patiently in the middle of her path, almost as if it had been waiting for her arrival.

Somewhat interested to hear the daily remark, Ellegaard retrieved the usual contents before closing the lid. After clasping the latch and reorienting herself with the planned path of travel, she opened the book’s smooth leather cover and set off again.

As per usual, Scribe had chosen to begin the conversation today:

**“All these different paths, all these open doors- and you still take the one most familiar.”**

A starter like no other.

_“Hello to you too, Scribe. What do you mean by that?”_

Ellegaard had barely finished her usual loop on the tails of her “Y”s before a reply began to materialize- and _quickly_. She watched as the elegantly slanted handwriting worked its way down the page, small indents appearing with each letter.

**“Why walk through an entire town to leave when you have a clear path through the wall?”**

Did they mean in the Order Hall?

She paused mid-stride in realization, unconsciously glancing back at the direction from whence she came. She had been in so much of a rush to move on that she completely blew past the easiest way out- and had taken the long path out of habit.

Lips pursed in thought, and gaze drifted away in embarrassment. What kind of engineer was she if she kept forgetting to use what she had been given?

_“...I suppose that would have been much faster than coming all the way out here.”_

Ellegaard had wanted to further explain herself, but Scribe’s continuation effectively cut her off.

**“The boundaries you respect are ones of your own making.** **_Between_ ** **is far too tricky of a realm for you to hold yourself back.”**

_“I’ll be sure to keep that in mind, then.”_

By the time she had finished her reply, Ellegaard was halfway through the expanse of grassy plains she had seen from the Order Hall. Tall shrubs and bushes bowed back and forth in the wind as she stepped straight through them, Magnus’s barking guffaws and Soren’s cheerful caroling echoing in her mind. It was a bittersweet journey despite the circumstances- and if she concentrated hard enough, she could almost imagine her friends just ahead of her.

She had to quickly shake the nostalgia from her mind before she could get distracted again.

_Focus._

As her weightless steps took her between and through undulating grasses, Ellegaard decided that she had a particular request of Scribe. She picked up her quill immediately, and began to write her own words with the never ending ink.

_“You told me once that everything in the_ Between _was just prey for the_ Hunt _. Since I’ve clearly fallen into that criteria, how would I go about preventing my demise?”_

There was a moment’s hesitation before their reply began to appear.

**“Well, I’d hardly consider any of its tries preventable. For now, all you need to do is keep moving. It’s beginning to get very frustrated with you- it thought it could take you just like it took the others.”**

It was an uncharacteristically lengthy reply for them, with several choices of wording that caught her attention.

_“Others, you said? How many have been here?”_

**“Enough to keep the beast satiated for eons. You’re not the first to roam here.”**

Her spine gave a violent shiver, sending sudden aching jolts of pain through her limbs as she passed through the final towering tufts of grass. 

Eons of people had been trapped here...

… But the _Between_ was dreadfully _empty._

Barely able to keep her feet on track, she began to scribble on a new page.

_“The first times it tried to take me- those were when I closed my eyes, right?”_

**“Correct. It reached for you, but you displayed too many signs of life for that approach to work.”**

She nodded, continuing to piece together what she had already experienced.

_“So, then it sent the Vex.”_

**“Yes, to lead you to it. You’ve been adjusting rather well so far- but it’s now figured out that it must adapt to take you, and it that it shall.”**

The momentary glow of pride from reading Scribe’s half-praise quickly sunk back into chilled anticipation when the rest of the sentence appeared. If it was so set on getting to her, then...

_“What happens when it has me?”_

She stood still and waited for them to reply.

The one thing about Scribe’s recent writing speed was that it was remarkably noticeable when they slowed. Ellegaard found herself staring at a blank space, each passing second plummeting her stomach further into an unsettling sense of dread.

After what felt like hours, (but was really only a couple minutes), she had decided to move the conversation forwards. Their silence said everything she needed to know.

_“What else can you tell me?”_

The reply came back full speed, confirming that Scribe had indeed chosen not to respond to her previous question.

**“Watch closely, and listen carefully. Be careful where you tread, for it lays in wait just beneath your feet.”**

There was a very palpable urgency behind their words today, and their own shorthand seemed to reflect that. It gave her a boost of adrenaline that she hadn’t expected, but welcomed wholeheartedly.

_After all_ , she reminded herself, _Scribe sees everything._

And that included the things with bad intentions for her.

Her mysterious informant had one last thing to add.

**“Keep a very strong hold on what you already know.”**

In terms of reassurance, it provided... Very little. But it gave Ellegaard an edge to her step as she moved forwards, and a perspective she appreciated.

She would have to add ‘Stay in one piece’ to her current to do list.

The current sky wasn’t nearly as radiant as it had been when she left the Order Hall. The brilliant blue of late noon was still visible, but only in patches obscured by dense plumes of grey clouds. The sun was much more weary now, too- clean rays had morphed into a solemn hue that casted a cooler light upon the ground.

It felt like the Earth was churning beneath her feet, and she was only now beginning to understand why.

Luckily enough for her, she wouldn’t be in the open for much longer. The long awaited temple came into view the moment she rounded a final hill, nestled on top of a steep incline and beckoning her closer with memories of home.

She glanced down at the book once more, hoping to catch a final remark from Scribe before their inevitable return to silence.

At the bottom of the page, just under their most recent sentence, read three simple words:

  
  
**“Be careful, Ellegaard.”**

-

By the time she had arrived at her destination, the atmosphere was streaked with fiery reds that even the murky sky had difficulty hiding. The sun had given up its throne quite some time ago, and emanated a final burst of light before its inevitable fall to the army of night.

The Order Temple itself was only partially bathed in the struggling rays of refulgence, barely illuminating the colored glass at its forefront. Entire chunks of foundation and walls were long gone, the empty spaces only slightly shrouded with the beginnings of overgrowth.

Ellegaard let out a shaky breath to calm her own racing heart, (When had that begun?) and phased through the solid iron door.

The temple’s interior, though deteriorating, still retained the layout she had grown to love so long ago. Fading sun passed through colored panes of glass, and adorned the stone floor with gentle spots of multicolored iridescence.

The gently lit spaces were arranged in a pattern she could recite with her eyes closed.

Red and green sat on the left and right respectively, while white and a brighter blue occupied the upper and lower portions of the arrangement.

The centre held the deepest shade of blue, nestled safely within the other colors.

As her boots soundlessly carried her down the main hall, fragments of old memories sought to make themselves known. And, as if by immediate request, there they were:

A figment of her mind conjured Soren’s cheerful skipping, the gentle tapping of his boots echoing throughout her consciousness.

Magnus’s heavy stomping came next, the usual indicator of a successful excursion- and the delicate clinking of potions from Ivor followed soon after. (Most likely in pursuit of the mildly injured rogue.)

The faint sensation of normality brought so much comfort that Ellegaard almost didn’t notice the clanging of armor.

It brought a shockingly clear visualization of Gabriel, just returning from his nightly patrols to join the rest of them for dinner.

She had attributed it to nothing more than a powerful nostalgia at first- but as she tuned in her focus to the empty halls, the jarring sound of metal on metal continued to emanate.

Her eyes widened in sudden shock.

_Someone_ was here.

Immediately, she rushed to pinpoint the sound’s location- and based on her own perception, its source _had_ to be just down the left hall. It clearly couldn’t have been the one in front of her, and the path to her right would carry her too far away.

There was no time to waste. After sparing the briefest of glances towards her current surroundings, Ellegaard was off- book safely held in one arm and quill tucked behind her right ear.

Now, the Order Temple had its fair share of complexities- and she certainly wasn’t complaining. Soren had poured his everything into the intricate design for weeks to ensure that they would all be safe, so it was only natural that he would construct certain parts in a more confusing manner than others.

She had oriented herself quickly upon arriving for the first time, although the others weren’t quite as lucky.

But despite knowing the ins and outs of the temple like her own machines, Ellegaard found herself slowly slipping into a state of confusion with every step she took.

The hallways had never been _this_ long before, for one- whereas the ordinary ones had been a form of sanctuary, these ones were more… Constricting. They seemed to roll out for as far as the eye could see- but still, the steady clanking of armor continued to beckon her onwards.

After what had to be at least ten minutes of walking, she had perked up upon seeing a light at the end of the hallway. It was a sight for sore eyes, and especially one for her aching ligaments- they had begun to pull ever so slightly at each other while she walked.

_Finally_ , she had thought, _some progress-_

...Only to be met with an iron door, and a painfully familiar arrangement of colors. Just outside of the stained glass was a night sky coated with clouds, muted moonlight casting the same multicolored glow upon the cracked floor of stone.

She was back in the foyer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, this is quite the predicament..
> 
> Here we are! This funky chapter was originally going to be much longer, but I performed the Big Chop so the story could have a bit more room! 😊 I think it was probably a good idea too, so I really hope this one was coherent!!


	12. Labyrinth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Twists, turns, and all for what?

Now,  _ that _ made no sense.

Ellegaard hurriedly paced around the small foyer, working out the details and diagramming her path with her fingers.

If she had gone left, and kept walking in a straight line without even the slightest of turns…

She turned to look at the hall she had come from, raising an eyebrow in realization.

...Then it was physically impossible for her to arrive back where she started, and much less from the opposite direction.

From the left hallway, the clanking continued to beckon to Ellegaard with a promising beating of heavy armor. It vowed that it would be better this time, and she’d find something if she  _ just _ continued to the left…

Her heart beat in an uneasy rhythm, and it was an occurrence that she was beginning to see a pattern in.

Ellegaard was forced to settle herself on the floor, (gently lowering herself so as not to aggravate anything further), and crossed her legs just in front of the moonlit glow on the floor.

If there was anything she had learned from her previous encounters with the  _ Hunt _ , it was that she needed to stay one step ahead. And right now, that one step meant retrieving the book from under her arm so that she could go over her most recent communication.

Scribe had warned that the  _ Hunt _ was beginning to adapt, and there was no doubt in her mind that this was one such example. The hallways had  _ never _ been that lengthy, and were far from painful to walk through.

One phrase in particular caught her attention: Scribe’s warning to both watch and listen, immediately followed by a recommendation to rely on her own knowledge.

She let out a sigh of frustration, and brushed a strand of hair behind her ear in a sharp gesture. It was hard to rely on what she knew when her surroundings kept  _ changing _ , and she couldn’t protect herself if-

That was when she caught a glimpse of the colored arrangement at her feet.

Red was on the left again, with white showing up faintly on the right; just below the center sat green, and the brightest blue was on the top-

_ Wait. _

Ellegaard blinked in astonishment. That wasn’t correct.

She pulled her aching being off of the ground, and tucked the quill behind her ear once more.

She had a theory here. But if she was going to make another move, she needed to test things first.

Tentatively, a few steps were taken towards the metallic noise housed by the left hallway- or, at least until she felt an oddly familiar ripping sensation slam through her every limb.

What had only been a faint humming in the back of her psyche suddenly jumped to a crescendo of deafening whispers that clouded her vision, and Ellegaard stumbled backwards with a sudden jolt of movement.

She clutched the sides of her head, and shut her eyelids tightly as she waited for her thoughts to come back.

When she could hear her own heartbeat again, and her lungs flooded with fresh air, she finally climbed back to her feet to check the moonlit colors again.

That had been to the left, in red’s direction- so it was logical to conclude that, despite the location of the sounds, the  _ Hunt _ was distorting the path she needed to take.

So with red out of the way, that left her with the corresponding white and blue hallways. (Green would take her back outside, and she had a feeling the  _ Hunt _ wouldn’t be inclined to let her walk out the door without some form of retaliation.)

If she turned right and continued down the white hall-  _ Soren’s hall _ , she remarked- then that would lead her back to where she had begun. So, if she took the one straight ahead-

_ Sky blue, _ she realized with a start. 

_ Gabriel’s hall. _

Ellegaard had a sneaking suspicion that the warrior’s corresponding hall would lead her to the source of the armor’s jubilant clanging- and her only option was to start off and pray that her assessment was correct.

Her discovery didn’t make the maze any less complex, however. The end of every hall brought the same interlude of the foyer, softly touched with the moonlight’s path through stained glass.

The next pause she came across had red to the left, as always- but this time, green was straight ahead with white leading outside.

The only thing she had to go off of was Gabriel’s hall, which would cause her to double back on herself. So, despite Ellegaard’s apprehension, she obeyed and started back- only to be met with an entirely new midpoint.

She continued to follow the promise of sky blue, realizing her method was working when the persistent aching started to withdraw. It seemed that the  _ Hunt _ realized, too- for as she walked, the beckoning call of metal would change positions drastically in an attempt to lead her elsewhere. At one point, there had even beed solid stone barricading the hall Gabriel’s color indicated; but she had only hesitated for a brief second before phasing through it completely and continuing on her mission.

So when the noise seemed to stay put as she neared the end of a hall, and she was met with familiar oak doors instead of the foyer…

Her heart soared as she drew closer, eventually phasing into a familiar room.

On the bed sat none other than the long awaited armor, attached to a warrior of sky blue.

-

Gabriel cursed his clamorous armor out of habit as he sat down, despite knowing that there was nobody here to jarr awake.

The temple was empty. He had made sure of it when he arrived a little while ago, patrolling the various halls and laying eyes on empty rooms- but the disadvantage to having such vociferous armor was that anyone nearby would know  _ he _ was here.

It was a glaring disadvantage from a tactical standpoint, but he hadn’t had tactics on his mind when he made the long walk over here.

Gabriel managed to convince himself that he was only here to gather any extra supplies left behind before he set off for a nearby town- but he knew it was a lie before the thought had even fully formed.

He suspected the reason he had found himself at his old home was the same reason he lingered in each room he checked, closing his eyes and slowing his breathing to absorb some of the warmth both he and the Temple had once been so full of.

The armor he wore- still as boisterous as it was the day it was forged- had been the only form of the past he could carry with him after everybody walked away, and he had always been determined to cloak himself in it.

The gauntlets around his wrists had been what he relied on to pull others up, to raise them, to  _ do _ \- but they hadn’t been able to hold the ones he held dear together. The only thing they did now was shake hands in every new town, and occasionally give the trademark  _ thumbs up _ the world seemed to associate with him.

The boots at his feet had walked thousands of miles in pursuit of the unknown, protected him as he moved about in combat- but somehow, they had walked away from those he loved the most. All they did now was send him through the motions, again and again, city to city… 

The broad chestplate had been what he held the rest of his family against, wrapping his arms around them to keep them safe from anything that dared to come against them- but it hadn’t protected them from the unseen threat of each other. All it did now was weakly hold him together, barely keeping his heart from falling apart.

And his helmet had once been a crown he had proudly worn, championing the symbol of  _ together _ that he foolishly believed would never leave- but it’s unspoken promise couldn’t change  _ their _ minds.

So he wore it as a mask now, shrouding his face with the falsehoods he had come to rely too heavily on- and after a certain amount of time, he realized he could no longer distinguish between the mask and himself.

It made him into a hero, the  _ “Gabriel the Warrior”  _ that the world couldn’t seem to get enough of- and he had no choice but to continue to don his mask to keep the whole thing alive.

It felt like he lost another piece of home every time- but by this point, Gabriel spent more time wearing his armor than anything else.

That was probably why, while searching the rooms for intruders he knew weren’t there, Gabriel had found his way to each of his old friends’ quarters.

Ivor had been the first to leave, and it was evident- his room had been stripped bare, with the very sheets of his bed taken in a hurry. There was hardly even anything for Gabriel to look at, as the entire place echoed with a deafening emptiness.

Soren’s room had been vacated in no less of a hurry- but despite the room being mostly empty, half-written books lay forgotten with sentences halted midway. The entire area looked like a paused train of thought, thrown aside to chase something more promising- and Gabriel knew he wouldn’t find anything of value amidst what was left behind.

Magnus’s quarters were far from pristine- bed unmade, various objects scattered about the floor. The pillows were squished and dented in a way that suggested the one who last slept in them hadn’t had a restful night. In Gabriel’s opinion, it made it seem like Magnus would be back any moment now, grumbling about how one of the others had forced him to clean it- but as much as he wanted to believe it was true, he needed to keep moving.

And then, there had been Ellie’s.

Her room was tidied in a method that was explicitly hers, with bed covers pulled tightly to eliminate any wrinkles. Old beginnings of forgotten contraptions she had probably long surpassed lay neatly arranged in a corner, and methodology books sat in an alphabetized row on their shelves.

Everything looked as if she had just organized it, and Gabriel was careful not to disturb anything.

She wouldn’t be coming back to fix it if he did, and he had failed to ensure that she  _ could. _

In the end, Gabriel hadn’t been able to remain in the room for more than a couple seconds, and stepped out with a wetness sliding down his cheeks.

So that brought him to his own strikingly bare room, sitting on the empty bed and prying off his helmet to cast it aside.

The night would fade eventually, the sun would begin to rise- and when that happened, he would become  _ Gabriel the Warrior _ again.

He would have to protect all those who needed him, despite his failure to protect  _ her _ \- and when that time came, he would be ready to hold the weight of the entire world on his shoulders.

But right now, all he could hold was himself.

-

The moment Ellegaard had recognized him, she nearly slipped through the floor out of shock.

She had been under the belief that the noise beckoning her here was none other than a lure for a trap- but to see it attached to Gabriel, living and breathing…

Her desire to be seen came back full force.

Even as she slowly moved closer, taking in every detail of the warrior she had dearly missed, it was hard to shake the pain that resided the last time she had called out to the ones she last remembered. They hadn’t seen her, hadn’t heard her- her outstretched arms had gone right through them as she reached for help.

So with everything considered, it would be incredibly foolish of her to think that Gabriel would be able to catch a glimpse of her- and as she cautiously stepped closer to her old friend, she drove the message into her mind.

Still, as she stood by his sitting frame, it was hard to suppress her longing to be  _ there  _ in a way that mattered, and the intense frustration that she  _ couldn’t _ .

Gabriel sat on the edge of his old bed, elbows resting on armored knees and face resting in gloved hands. His helmet lay overturned by his feet, freeing his head from the normal restraints; his back rose and fell with steady breaths that hitched every now and then.

It wasn’t often that the great warrior let himself rest.

So Ellegaard sat right in front of his boots, placing the book and quill down so her hands could sit comfortably in her lap. Tilting her head upwards ever so slightly meant that she could gaze idly at him in a mock form of eye contact, and she was more than happy to do just that.

_ I’m sorry Gabe, _ she thought, knowing that he wouldn’t hear her.

He had been the one to keep them safe, both separately and as one; whether it was scouting for the staggering undead that they would run into on their way home, or the way he would protect them from the venom of their own tongues, Gabriel had always been there for  _ all  _ of them.

Even in the End, when everything had begun to go awry and the beast’s jaws began to snap closer to their own faces, he had pushed them all behind him.

He had been determined to give his life, even if it had only meant they would all live for a couple seconds longer.

When they- when the  _ world _ \- needed Gabriel, he was always there.

But when the warrior needed someone?

The world turned away, and left him to quietly break within the confines of an abandoned room.

It was a horrid twist of fate that made her stomach churn. So, despite the pain coming to him had brought, she was grateful that she had been able to escape the  _ Hunt _ ’s everchanging labyrinth to be beside the weary warrior- even if he wouldn’t be able to know.

Now that she was able to consider her circumstances, Ellegaard realized that she didn’t have the slightest inclination as to why the  _ Hunt _ was so determined to keep her from Gabriel- especially if she couldn’t interact with him.

_ Nothing _ was without a logical explanation, however- and the cunning beast beneath her feet was no exception.

And besides, she thought, the  _ Hunt _ had made a critical lapse in judgement that she’d now have the pleasure of archiving.

By working so hard to keep her from reaching Gabriel, it had unintentionally given her a clear indicator of when she was onto what it didn’t want her to see- and she could gauge her proximity to something of significance.

The faint echoes of pain had long faded from her limbs by the time Gabriel began to stir, armor sounding in the same metallic clanging that had led her here. She responded accordingly, sliding back and grabbing her resting book and quill from the spot she had placed them.

By this point, an early glow had begun to radiate from the horizon and through the nearby window- the room that she now recognized as Gabriel’s own was beginning to soak in the morning rays, pain of night only a fading memory now.

The warrior seemed to be doing better than before, much to her own pleasure. Gabriel lifted his head from his hands, his line of sight traveling directly through her- and with a couple swift movements, his helmet was sitting atop his head once more.

She climbed to her feet as the warrior did the same, and watched him twist his torso in the usual fashion of stretching before gathering his thoughts.

The sun had risen, and they would begin anew.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We finally have another Old Order Member sighting! But what does this mean?
> 
> Schoolwork and I had a long battle to get this chapter out, but when inspiration slams you in the middle of the night it's hard not to answer!! 😊 I also have a couple secret surprises in the works for the story in general, and I'm super excited to get them out!!  
> Thanks so much for reading! I hope you enjoyed, and see you next chapter!! 😊


	13. Replace

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It is time to turn our faces towards the future.. No matter how much the past calls to us.
> 
> Right?

Dawn always had a way of rebirthing all that the night had hidden.

Gabriel was the first to walk out of the now sunlit room, and Ellegaard had no choice but to phase through the door he immediately chose to shut in her face.

_ Thanks, Gabe.  _ She sighed and shook her head, something akin to a reluctant smile on her lips.

Even still, walking alongside Gabriel brought a sense of catharsis that loosened her shoulders; although he wasn’t aware that she was beside him, it was somewhat comforting to feel less alone in the Temple. It was an even greater relief to follow the still waking warrior down an ordinary, non-shifting hall, and she had almost called out to him as thanks for keeping the  _ Hunt _ away.

The corridors were delightfully short, and warmly lit windows cast light upon Gabriel’s armor as he walked past. Sun rebounded off of his armor, gleaming with pride- and sun shone right through her own form, scoffing at the same slightly worn clothes on her back that had collided with the tree so long ago.

Her being clung to the last thing it could remember in the same way that Gabriel coated himself in his own armor, a stable constant that kept them anchored while everything else fell into- or out of- place around them.

And that was just it- her world was constantly shifting every time she thought she had learned everything there was to know, and it felt wrong to be unable to accurately hypothesize what would happen next. Her days in Redstonia, while somewhat repetitive, were at least  _ stable _ .

But then again, engineers always had a way of delving into the unstable, whether intended or not. 

A wry chuckle nearly escaped her lips. If Gabriel had seen her, he would have shook his head, placed a gloved hand on her shoulder, and told her to “ease up on the brainpower.”

_ I can’t just do that, Gabe,  _ she would always reply, throwing her hands up in mock exasperation and doing her best to hide a smile. This time, she stared at his back as if that would somehow make him hear her thinking it.

_ This is simply too massive of a predicament. _

They were back in the foyer in almost no time, golden rays of sun beaming through a properly aligned arrangement of colors. There was a quiet stillness about the space, which was no longer riddled with the low humming of whispers.

The Temple was truly at rest now.

Gabriel himself, who had no knowledge of the  _ Hunt’s _ previous activity or even of the beast itself, seemed to linger for a moment, his eyes drifting over the soft glow in the same manner hers had the previous night..

She imagined he was going through his own form of nostalgia, (albeit without the everchanging labyrinth that followed immediately after), and busied herself with checking the book she had pressed to her side.

There was nothing new from Scribe, as expected- and as opposed to the previous night, their previous conversation was nowhere to be found. Ellegaard began to wonder if they had chosen to leave their advice where she could access it, or if they had simply become too distracted to remove it.

It  _ was _ odd that they hadn’t placed the ordinary chest to collect their means of communication, though. Coincidences were few and far between in this realm- so had Scribe known that the  _ Hunt _ was going to attack?

A sudden shrill grating sound emanated from beside her as a wincing Gabriel forced upon the rusted iron door.

“....Need to find a replacement for this,” he muttered, speaking for the first time since she had run into him.   
  


Ellegaard waited until he had opened the door to exit, preferring to slip through alongside him instead of watching him shut her in again.

Now that he was outside, Gabriel visibly straightened his shoulders and faced the direction she had come from the previous day.

He was set on something, that was for sure- and she was determined to see him through it. So the two of them set off towards Beacontown, Ellegaard coming forwards to walk next to him.

The sunrise had burned away all remnants of night by this point, and wispy streaks of clouds were dyed a spectacular gold as the sun reclaimed its crown. The same color had trickled down to Earth in delicate droplets, and kissed the various flora and fauna with a similar tenderness.

Gabriel and Ellegaard walked side by side through the delicately lit land, tracing the same path they had always taken to arrive at the temple. The walk was completely devoid of conversation, Gabriel basking in the morning glory and Ellegaard basking in his company, and the clanging of the warrior’s armor reverberated through trees, hills, grasses…

Given the peaceful tranquility of the environment, Ellegaard was rather disappointed when they finally arrived at Beacontown’s buzzing entrance.

The armored man wasted no time in stepping through the gates, navigating the masses of people much better than she had the day before- and she relied on the steady glinting of his armor to lead her through.

Where crowds had once parted to allow them passage was a gaping apathy- Gabriel had once led the charge, people on both sides parting to let their group through. Now he wove through the narrow gaps in the crowd, keeping his head down and turning away whenever he accidentally met a gaze.

It would be just the two of them, a shunned warrior and his friend lost to the world, that would eventually make their way to the Order Hall.

_ Maybe I should have just waited here for another day, _ Ellegaard thought to herself.  _ It could have saved me a trip. _

What had he come here to do, anyway?

His face, as usual, gave no indication of what he was planning- only the same set confidence that had become such a key part of him. Gabriel strode into the massive building, seeming to appreciate its grandeur for a moment before continuing down the velvet walkway.

Just alongside him, Ellegaard wove between the platforms of artifacts and treasures until Gabriel stopped in front of something she had missed during her last visit.

The Order’s Amulet sat on its own golden pedestal just up the top of the small flight of stairs, hovering gently and emanating a bright blue glow as Gabriel approached.   
  
Oh, how  _ stupid _ \- How did she miss this the last time she was here?

Scribe had clearly been onto more than she originally thought when they told her to watch closely. In between her self-admonitions was the thought of what could have been accomplished had she paid a bit more attention.

Her friend lifted the relic with a tender hand, and turned it over in his hands to examine it. His fingers ran over his diamond, then Magnus’s emerald, Soren’s iron…

They lingered for a moment over her portion, and Gabriel’s now misty eyes began to blink rapidly.

Ellegaard’s shoulders fell, and she had just begun to reach out to him when his face was illuminated by a deeper hue of blue, emanating from the amulet’s center.

_ Ivor? _ That couldn’t be right, where-

A pair of footsteps echoed through the hall, and answered her question before it could fully form. Both she and Gabriel turned around, greeted with the sight of none other than the alchemist himself gliding down the carpeted walkway.

Gabriel was much less surprised than she, and greeted Ivor with a slight nod of the head as he climbed the small set of stairs.

The other man dipped his head in return, albeit not without a palpable tension between the two- and as they gathered around the amulet, Ellegaard stepped to the side to get a better look at them.

It was clear that Gabriel had been expecting to see Ivor here, that was for certain- but there wasn’t any indication as to why.

She hadn’t been there for the spawning of the Witherstorm- didn’t see the fueled scowl Ivor wore when he summoned the beast, didn’t hear the break in Gabriel’s voice when it all came to life. But the absence of their own charged feelings left a tense silence between the two men that almost made Ellegaard wince.

There was a time when they weren’t like this.

Ivor spoke first, muttering under his breath as he gathered a couple ingredients she couldn’t recognize from a satchel at his side.

“Oh, what we do to erase the past.”   
  
Gabriel gave a terse nod and held onto the amulet as the robed man worked, while Ellegaard inched closer to get a proper look at his face. He wore an expression behind his gleaming diamond helmet that she couldn’t quite name- and, she realized, he probably couldn’t either.

“How long will it take to reprogram the amulet?”

Reprogram? Her breath caught in her chest- if they were resetting the amulet, then that would mean...   
  
Ivor grasped the old relic. “I’ve already completed the initial steps. All that’s left to do is finish the procedure, and it’ll show the new owners.”   
  
He looked towards Gabriel, preparing to ask him to hold something. But Gabriel wasn’t looking at him.

His eyes were focused on the amulet, the left branch specifically.

As Ellegaard followed his gaze, she found the cause: the redstone gem, previously entirely dull, housed the smallest pinpoint of light at its center.

It was broken, it was barely clinging to one final plea for life- but it was  _ there _ , and Gabriel saw it.

She looked between the warrior and the alchemist, eyes widening and heart pounding. Gabriel seemed to freeze in place, looking to Ivor and back at the light as his hands began to shake.

“Is that-? Ivor, you’re seeing this?”

The dark bearded man’s brows tensed. “I  _ see _ it- but we’re around a lot of light right now.”   
  
He began to manipulate the faintly glowing relic, Gabriel shaking his head quickly and Ellegaard beginning to grow frantic.

_ Don’t change it yet, I’m here _ \- her book and quill fell to the floor, resting on the quartz-  _ I’m right here, please- _

“I don’t want to hold on too tightly to the past, Ivor.” Gabriel began, a waver in his voice. “But in the off case that this is something-”

“-it  _ isn’t. _ ” Ivor’s expression was set, his hands tense as he snapped in reply. “The amulet has done this before everything- Before everything happened.”

Ellegaard began to wring her own shaking hands, stuck between reaching for the amulet or one of the men. There  _ had _ to be something she could grab on to, something she could do-

Ivor continued. “It would misdirect, mislead upon occasion.. It’s for the better that we’re resetting it. It won’t give us or the New Order false hope any longer.”

Her fingertips grazed Gabriel ever so slightly, the warrior’s armor still glinting in the sun-

-and then she was looking down at armored arms, with gloved hands grasping the amulet.

_ What? _

Ivor’s face was directly in front of her, but it was Gabriel he was speaking to- and it was Gabriel’s hands that held the amulet, despite her eyes seeing through his own.

The warrior’s voice sounded clearly in her head, and it felt as if she were saying the words herself. “I’ll take your word, Ivor.” A sigh. “I certainly hope we don’t regret this.”

He didn’t seem to know that she was… wherever this was- and Ellegaard found that she couldn’t move any part of the body she was viewing the world through.

With a final intricate movement of the fingers, the faint red pinpoint went dim. Ivor was finished, and he let the amulet rest in Gabriel’s hands.

And then, in the blink of an eye, she was looking at his face again- from her own body, now, arms still outstretched and her own eyes watching him relinquish the recalibrated relic to its podium.

Shoulders slumping and heart sinking, she returned her arms to her side as Ivor closed his satchel with a sigh.

The two men stood beside one another for what felt like an eternity, Ellegaard staring at them and them looking anywhere but the other.

Gabriel was the first to break the silence. “They’ll be accounted for now, wherever they go.” Rubbing his forehead, he started down the stairs as his armor began to sound again. His sword swang weakly at his hip, knocking against the side of his leg every so often.

“And where will you go, Gabriel?” Ivor had turned to face the warrior as he left, his back to Ellegaard. Oddly enough, there was no hint of malice in his voice- just a quiet curiosity hiding behind the darks of his eyes.

“Wherever I’m needed.” A brief pause as the helmet was pushed further down onto his head. “You won’t need the amulet to find me.”

There was no response from Ivor- but then again, Gabriel had stated his intentions in such a way that a reply wouldn’t be necessary.

Ivor and Ellegaard stared at the back of his armor, boisterous and gleaming, until they could no longer see it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And here we are, at another standstill.. And with even more questions than before.
> 
> Woohoo, finally got this one edited!! 😊 I'm a bit unsure if this is moving too fast, so I *may* come back and change up some things later- but overall, I think I might leave the seeds in this chapter so they can grow further in the story! It's also a bit shorter than I wanted, but I think it said everything it needed to say!
> 
> I hope you enjoyed!! (I know I sure cried during editing!) See you next chapter! 😊


	14. Once

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes, once is all you need.

After Gabriel had left the Order Hall, Ellegaard had found herself rooted in place atop the gleaming quartz stairs, still processing.

_What in the world had she just managed to do?_

She had seen _far_ more than previously expected from a viewpoint she had never even remotely considered possible- and, she thought to herself, Scribe was going to get the pleasure of hearing _all_ of her complaints on the matter whenever they chose to communicate again.

Ivor seemed to share a similar sentiment of overwhelming disbelief, and his raven hair shifted to fall down his back as he glanced over at the amulet.

For a moment his brow raised in a form of silent contemplation, and he muttered something to himself that Ellegaard couldn’t make out. An unspoken question lingered just at the edge of his tongue, which was quickly bitten back as he tore his eyes from the recalibrated relic.

It was oddly uncharacteristic of him to remain here for so long. This wasn’t quite the Ivor she last remembered, filled with a bitter animosity eroding him away from the inside out. This Ivor, while far from the friend she had once fought alongside, was more of a silent- but consistent- presence.

He had clearly intended to meet with Gabriel, they had both been on the same page in terms of the amulet- but it certainly didn’t make much sense for them to do this out of the blue.

There were things that she had missed, she realized. Ellegaard was only getting half of the story, but she had no way of seeing everything. And until she could find a way to see that other half, all she could do was blindly connect the dots.

Ivor, in the meantime, had lifted his gaze to just beyond the exit. One foot was slowly picked up, then the other; he settled into a gradual focused rhythm down the quartz stairs, across the maroon carpet path, out the doorway.

Ellegaard let him go. She had a feeling he wouldn’t be far.

What she _needed_ to be doing right now was going over what she had learned during the past twenty four hours. If she could list things down, maybe…

Dark strands of hair were tucked behind an ear as Ellegaard knelt to pick up her book and quill from where they had fallen. The book had fallen face-down, its pages spread open on the colorless floor where her old friends had just stood; the snowy feather of the quill lay only a few mere inches away.

She had to flip over the unblemished leather book to get to the pages, their corners beginning to fold ever so slightly. When the waiting ink came into view, Ellegaard had originally thought that it to be a remnant of her last communications with Scribe.

As it turned out, it was the beginning of a new one.

Black ink on the page read, elegantly:

  
  
**“Well, I’m pleasantly surprised. You’re back, and in one piece nonetheless.”**

_“Very nice to see you’ve decided to finish the silent game. Yes, I’m back- and I have more than a few questions for you.”_

**“Oh dear, you’ve gotten into one of your interrogation moods. Don’t make me limit you again.”**

Ellegaard pulled at her sleeves and gave a sharp exhale. Like it or not, she _was_ going to get her answers out of them eventually, no matter how many limits they imposed on her.

_“I sincerely hope that you won’t, I’ve learned quite a bit.”_

**“That you have. Paying attention to the labyrinth was crucial- do you see now why I told you to look carefully?”**

_“It certainly makes much more sense. Although with how cunning you said the_ Hunt _was, I was expecting it to not leave such a glaring indicator.”_

Before Scribe could reply, she added:

_“How did it do that, anyways? If the Between is its realm, it shouldn’t be able to impact the living realm just like me, right?”_

**“Two in one go, hm? Well, to be frank with you, no. The** **_Hunt_ ** **didn’t change the living realm while you were at the temple.”**

She had picked up her quill to probe further, but they were already a step ahead of her.

**“And before you ask, it didn’t take anything from the living world either. It merely changed the way in which you walk through the Between, and diverted your path into a maze with** **_It_ ** **at the centre.”**

_It didn’t take anything other than me,_ she thought, but Ellegaard kept that to herself.

It was a concept she needed a second to wrap her head around. That made the Between some kind of… Transparent world, in which she could walk through it and simultaneously travel in the living realm.

Which meant that what was a horrifyingly twisted maze to her was a simple, straightforward path to those who lived.

If she fell into its waiting clutches, nobody would know any better.

**“There you go.”**

Ellegaard shook her head with a resigned sigh, pulling herself out of her own head to scribble a reply.

_“Every time we talk, I get more and more convinced that you_ can _read my thoughts.”_

**“And every time, I tell you that I can’t- your face tells many stories, and you are an avid teller of tales.”**

_“Well, if you’re right, I’ll need to do a better job with that.”_

They didn’t have a response to that, which left Ellegaard free to continue.

_“But aside from the_ Hunt, _other things have been happening. Like when I tried to touch Gabriel- what was that?”_

**“You are a** **_riot_ ** **, I tell you. That was all you.”**

All _her_?

_“I’m pretty sure I didn’t see through other eyes the last time I tried to touch someone.”_

**“Well of course not. It just means you’re changing.”**

Much to Ellegaard’s annoyance, Scribe seemed to deem that answer sufficient enough to leave it as is. As opposed to their last meeting, when they had been practically overflowing with warnings for her, it looked like they were back to their old ways.

But then again, everything Scribe had skirted over in their earlier conversations returned later. It wasn’t hard to believe that they would come back to it in the future, whenever it became relevant- and, Ellegaard hoped, not while she was facing an imminent threat again.

She would rather get a chance to know and prepare ahead than come face to face with something else she had never encountered before. If Scribe’s description of the beast hunting her down was correct, (and with each passing day she was beginning to accept it as such), then that meant it was likely for it to be hunting her down at this very moment.

That realization seemed to shake her into action, and she lifted her eyes from the slightly yellowed pages of the book to look around.

From the way things were going, she needed to _move_ \- and quickly. Going back to the stump wasn’t an option at this point- it would corner her, and the last thing she needed was to make it any easier for the _Hunt_ to get to her.

Ellegaard began to pace about, soundless steps from her dull boots carrying her up and down the top step of the stairs.

She could always stay in Beacontown; it was growing at an almost disorienting rate, and there would no doubt be enough room for her to stay on the move. But the more she mulled over it, the uneasier she became- there was no indication as to how large or how fast the _Hunt_ was. Beacontown could quickly become a cage if she wasn’t careful, and it wouldn’t be worth the risk.

What she needed, she realized, was a map of sorts. The amulet, even if she _could_ have touched it, was entirely useless to her now that it had been reset- but if it was distance she was aiming for, getting a solid layout in front of her would aid her escape.

It was unlikely that Beacontown had developed any official maps of the area, much less while they were so focused on expanding the architecture of the city. An older map would be more reliable, holding landmarks that she would recognize.

_The Temple had a map_ , she realized with a start. She had seen it after Jesse and Olivia had recruited her, of _course-_

Ellegaard paused midstep, and turned her attention towards the door both Gabriel and Ivor had exited through.

She had already seen Ivor twice here- it was safe to say that he’d be relatively easy to locate when she came back.

And Gabriel himself had told Ivor that he wouldn’t need the amulet to locate him- so, apprehensive as she was, they would still be nearby while she traveled.

Ellegaard stepped towards the sweeping window at the end of the hall, open book pressed against her side and the quill still in her hand.

It was her turn to leave.

-

Admittedly, Ellegaard had been incredibly apprehensive upon returning to the temple.

It felt rather counterproductive to walk herself _back_ to the last place she had experienced the _Hunt_ , and her stomach increased its churning with each step. The meaning behind its name was becoming painfully evident the more she thought about it- her heart beat with a preparatory swiftness, and it was difficult to keep herself from becoming jittery.

Ellegaard supposed that was all by design- the constant stalking, the persistent feeling of dread. They both served to remind her that she wasn’t as alone as she wanted to be- at least, not in this realm.

The sinking sun did nothing to quell her anxiousness, especially with it being the same time of day she had last traveled. Fiery scarlets sunk into a sweeping lilac color that coated the middle of the sky, and if she looked closely enough, she would notice that the stars had come out early to greet her. They hid behind darkening lavender clouds scattered across the heavens, and the familiar milky crescent had only begun to peek out from behind the cover of the east horizon.

Scribe chose to speak up again as she turned a corner, Ellegaard nearly missing their communication while she pulled herself back into reality. (Bleakly, some part of her remarked that Magnus would have chided her for being in the clouds again if he were here.)

**“Nice to see you’ve decided to keep moving.”**

_“Nice to see you’ve decided to write again, Scribe.”_

**“Well, where are you off to? Surely not the Temple again.”**

She tapped the feathered end of the quill against her forehead as she continued through a small cluster of trees.

_“I’m afraid so. I’m still working out the logistics of where exactly I’m going, but the Temple has a map I can use.”_

She followed her punctuation with another query.

_“I’d also like to know more about the Hunt. If its name really fits it, where does it follow me from? Apart from the Vex, who’ve also made themselves scarce, I haven’t seen any indication of it.”_

Scribe’s response came slowly, their handwriting as neat and elegant as before.

**“Still the same as the last time I told you. Right beneath your feet.”**

A pause, during which Ellegaard’s heart dropped as she remembered their words.

_“I had hoped that was a temporary thing.”_

**“I’m afraid not. Beneath you is where it performs whatever it needs to take you- whether that’s reaching to grab you, sending its Vex to do its bidding, or rearranging your path from below.”**

_“Well, with the whole path rearranging- While I was back in the hall, I said that it didn’t make sense for it to leave such a glaring discrepancy in its labyrinth.”_

**“That’s the drawback to being of the** **_Between._ ** **As much as it tries, as much as it takes from the living realm.. It’ll never be able to replicate it perfectly.”**

Ellegaard nodded slowly, more to herself than anyone else. She continued to write as she slipped around a rotting corpse of a zombie, it's sunken eye sockets looking right through her.

_“I have another question.”_

**“This is your last one.”**

_“Have you ever seen the_ Hunt?”

**“Once.”**

_“And?”_

**“I choose not to look for too long anymore.”**

Now, _that_ was alarming.

_“How bad is this thing if you can't even look at it?”_

**“You’re exceeding your question limit for today. And it isn’t that I** **_can’t_ ** **look, like some frightened child- rather, I choose not to. Looking at it won’t make me record it any differently than the way I already am.”**

There was a moment’s pause before they added on.

**“Not everything is meant to be seen, Ellegaard.”**

_My entire existence hinges on how well I can see this thing,_ she wanted to retort, but she ultimately decided to put her quill to rest. It was clear that further probing wasn’t going to get her anywhere.

And besides- she could see the Temple again.

-

Phasing through the door again felt like disturbing the Temple’s rest.

There was a stagnant silence that had settled into the darkened halls, both comforting and uneasy.

One one hand, it meant that there was no steady buzzing just in her ears, which meant that the _Hunt_ hadn’t waited here for her- but it also meant that she was alone again, in that way that sent shivers down her spine.

Much to her own pleasure, the halls didn’t shift or elongate once she had phased inside, nor did the stairs change as she climbed them.

Ellegaard found the large map right where she had last seen it, hanging on a wall parallel to the amulet’s contraption. The last time she had been here was to group with the odd team of sorts dedicated to bringing down the beast, and she had found herself too put off by Magnus’s boisterous presence to take things in as much as she would have wanted.

So now she stood just before the great directory, tugging gently on her sleeves as her eyes roved the depictions of landmarks near and far.

Jesse and the rest of their troupe had used the amulet before to locate her, Magnus, Soren, Ivor… But Ellegaard wouldn’t be nearly as lucky to have an indicator. So she was left to estimate general locations.

What she could see, however, was Soren’s fortress- though she doubted he’d be somewhere they already knew of. It lay nestled into the mountains, surrounded by a gathering of murky swamps and dense forests.

As much as her heart ached to go search for the architect, his fortress was… Disorienting, for lack of a better term. She couldn’t even remember how she had managed to find her way out- and walking into an already confusing environment for the _Hunt_ to rearrange would be like walking into a baited trap.

That left her between Redstonia and Boomtown.

A sudden shudder wracked her body, and she nearly dropped her book. Redstonia was no more- she had watched the Witherstorm tear it limb from limb.

Would there even be anything- or any _one_ \- left for her to visit?

She ran a hand through her hair, her eyes downcast as she shook her head slightly.

_No._ She could navigate that hurdle when the time came, and when she had learned more about her own condition. With everything she had done in the past few days, it was evident that _something_ was changing, and Ellegaard would rather learn about it with as little emotional distraction as possible.

Tired brown eyes followed another pathway to the opposite side of the map, her gaze zeroing in on the destination.

It was settled. She would go to Boomtown.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A new plan for action! I wonder how this'll play out...
> 
> My favorite part of writing this chapter was Scribe and their antics _by far!_ I can hardly wait to keep working on the coming chapters!  
> And if you're reading this, Happy Holidays! I hope you get a nice, long amount of rest this season, make sure to be kind to yourself!! 😊


	15. Queen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Queen was clever. Pay close attention.

After deciding on her path of travel, Ellegaard opened the leather book under her arm to a clean page. The quill darted back and forth across the paper as she lightly sketched a replica of the larger map in front of her, making sure to add more detail to larger landmarks that might call her attention.

If she was going to put herself in danger by coming back to the Temple, it was going to be worth her while. It would mean less writing space for conversations with Scribe, but... 

She had a feeling they’d find a way to work around it.

Now that she had gotten everything she needed, (and was confident she wouldn’t have to return again), Ellegaard wasted no time nearly flying down the stairs and out of the deteriorating stone temple. 

The _Hunt_ had left her alone there, sure- but she didn’t want to stick around for it to change its mind.

The most logical choice would be for her to access the Nether railways; that was how Jesse and Olivia had found her in the first place, wasn’t it?

A brief smile. She had always been so proud of the railway system.

The portal would be a faster method of transport than her own running, and much easier; Soren had ensured that it would be within walking distance of the Temple for simple convenience.

So if it was just habit that was carrying her feet, then she was immensely thankful- it took Ellegaard to a smaller pocket in the ridged hillside that became more familiar with each step, and into the much darker space.

Much to her own surprise, the Nether portal inside had managed to remain lit after all the destruction the Witherstorm had wrought; a gentle violet glow emanated from within it, and tranquil particles of the same color drifted down to rest on stilled puddles of water. There were no ripples as Ellegaard made her way closer to the portal, nor was there any splash or reflection of the slightly scuffed boots on her feet.

Her hands gripped the leather binding of the book as she stepped into the violet film between dimensions, squeezing her eyes shut against the familiar dizziness that came with the travel.

And then she waited.

Thirty seconds passed with her eyes tightly closed.

...It was a _bit_ odd for it to be taking so long today. It would usually only take a couple seconds maximum before the telltale crackling of uncontrolled flames would greet her, followed by the distant hoarse screeches of a ghast or two.

Perhaps it was something to do with her current state. Ellegaard sighed and stepped out from the portal’s other side, expecting a sea of red.

What she received was a solid stone cave wall, which she no doubt would have bumped into had she been able to touch it.

Furrowing her brows, Ellegaard turned around and came face to face with the Nether portal...

...Which was silhouetted by the very same cave she had entered, puddles and all.

She nearly dropped the book as she whipped it open, her quill prepared to scribble her question down before Scribe could beat her to the chase- but it appeared they had already gotten a head start on their mockery.

On the page directly after her hand drawn map read:

**“I was wondering when you were going to realize it wasn’t working.”**

It was all she could do to not roll her eyes, although it didn’t stop her cheeks from tingling with shame.

_“I greatly appreciate your help, Scribe. Really.”_

**“Oh, you’re very welcome.”**

_“Am I going to get a real explanation for why I can’t use the portal?”_

**“Perhaps.”**

When their silence began to drag on, Ellegaard decided to prod them a little more. She needed to be on the move before a particularly unsavory fate could catch up to her, and this little game of _show-don’t-tell_ would be incredibly counterproductive to that.

_“Will I be getting said explanation in the next sixty seconds?”_

**“It’s one you’ve already received in some shape or form. You’ve probably deduced by now that you’re unable to interact with the things of the living- and portals aren’t an exception, I’m afraid.”**

Ellegaard frowned, and stepped around the still glowing portal. That would throw a wrench into her plans.

_“Which means that I’m going to be moving on foot.”_

**“Good thing you jotted that map down.”**

She let out a sigh as she exited the cave’s gaping maw of an entrance, focused on _not_ phasing through the side of the hill. Her own inability to access other dimensions meant that her trip to Boomtown would take longer than she had initially thought.

Her eyes widened as she reached the bottom of the hill, various grasses swaying occasionally in the midnight breeze.

The Nether, the End… Those were both places _Soren_ considered his refuge, the End especially. If she couldn’t get to those…

Her shoulders slumped. She wouldn’t be able to get to him, no matter how far she ran or how hard she fought against the _Hunt_.

He would sit behind the portal, just out of reach of her own dead hands.

-

Ellegaard began her journey under a blanketed sky of deep indigo, glittering with the blinking stars woven into its threads. The Earth itself had been gently draped in darkness for a couple hours now, giving the undead a cloak to move under; rotting corpses of the undead and slowly hissing creepers alike bathed in gentle rays of moonlight as they slunk about.

The engineer herself had her book propped open in its usual fashion on her arm, and every so often she would glance down at the hastily scribbled map on the left side.

Scribe’s earlier writings lay on the right side, the dark ink still managing to stand out despite the lack of sunlight.

They were silent for now, however- and Ellegaard chose to use this time for her own thought. (Like she hadn’t had enough of it already.)

Had she ever really been to Boomtown?

She had heard of it, sure- Redstonia tended to receive news rather quickly, and the city of griefers had always managed to find its way into the daily happenings. When she was lucky enough (or unfortunate enough, she hadn’t yet decided) to hear the topic come up in the conversations of other engineers, they had usually described it as nothing but untamed chaos.

Seeing as Magnus was at its helm, that didn’t seem too far off from her own expectations.

So why exactly was she heading there, again? Was she looking for-

Ellegaard quickly shook her head, and gave the map an unnecessary glance. (She wasn’t even remotely close to the nearest range of hills she had marked down.)

She knew full well what the answer to her question was- but something else was currently demanding her attention.

It darted across her vision in the speed it would take to blink, a wispy blur of… Something pale. A single wingbeat confirmed her suspicions immediately:

The Vex had been sent to track her down again.

Ellegaard found herself with no choice but to pick up her own pace; if the beast had sent its servants after her, then it couldn’t be far. But as her eyes darted to and from the book in her arms, she found that the flighty winged beings weren’t the only thing to return. Scribe was writing something to her- and despite her inclination to keep an eye out, she put her attention into the right page.

If they were choosing _now_ of all times to write to her, then it had to be for _something_.

**“Keep moving, and keep your eyes on this page. I have a story for you.”**

She nearly stumbled trying to get ahold of her quill, her fingers beginning to shake- but Scribe was one step ahead.

**“Don’t bother with replying right now. This is the story of the Queen.”**

She obeyed, albeit skeptically, and forced her gaze towards the paper in front of her. In the corners of her vision, pale blurs of light darted back and forth in a dizzying dance- but the moment she turned her head towards them, they would seemingly vanish. Then, the cycle repeated; this time on her other side.

In the book, Scribe had already written several phrases in what was becoming their signature handwriting style, short and concise with an elegant swirl here and there.

**“Thousands of years before you lived a prospering kingdom. It grew out of nothing but the darkness of the Earth, and quickly bloomed into what would become the center of all human life near and far. It wasn’t long before smaller civilizations began to sprout from the stream of riches it produced- but, as always, with new nations comes new conflicts.”**

Ellegaard gave the map a quick glance as she headed into a forest- but when her peripheral vision began to show a familiar pattern of anguished faces on the bony skeletal trunks, she took a sharp turn to the right and broke away into a nearby field.

**“One of said conflicts happened to be under the rule of a newly coronated Queen. She was the sole heir to the throne, her father having passed a couple weeks prior with no other children to take his place. Neighboring kingdoms scoffed at her rule, especially one in particular- and within a couple days, a plan for her assasination was made.”**

Ellegaard, who had slowed her pace ever so slightly upon putting distance between her and those _awful_ trees, raised an eyebrow- but continued onwards.

**“The Queen, however, was no fool. She knew what her coronation meant to the surrounding cities, and that it would be remarkably easy for a new ruler to be instituted should she lose her life. What she had that the other rulers lacked was** **_allies_ ** **, kept both close to her and dispersed throughout her own city. They provided her with valuable information that she couldn’t see otherwise, and she was clever in building her relationships with them.”**

She had wanted to inquire more about this queen’s specific allies, and what that meant, but the Vex had begun to dance just out of reach of her own gaze again. Ellegaard flipped the page to follow Scribe’s writing, and sped away into the moonlit grassland.

**“One day, as she was out on a stroll, one of said allies warned her that a King had positioned several snipers in various positions in her kingdom- but that he had no clue as to where. He begged her to remain in the castle- but she simply smiled, and politely excused herself to continue on her way.”**

_Well that’s a rather bold move,_ Ellegaard thought. She was admittedly beginning to question what this story meant for her exactly, and why Scribe was taking the time to describe it in such detail.

**“She came to a bakery, and paused at the counter with her back to the street. Behind her, three snipers readied their bows. In a calm voice, she asked the woman at the counter if the shop behind her had any robes not revealed yet- the baker, with a slight nod of the head, said that there were three that she knew of, and that it would be better to continue on her way. The Queen thanked her, and hurried along- avoiding the three snipers.”**

Ellegaard’s eyes began to widen as Scribe went on and on through the story, giving small hums of satisfaction whenever the Queen would run into someone whose perspective directed her away from the waiting doom. By the time the tale had come to an end, the Queen had escaped to a safe house in the kingdom’s center as the failed snipers retreated back to where they had come from.

_“She was very fortunate to have those people on her side. If she had been a bad queen, they would have probably refused to tell her anything.”_

**“Very much so.”**

_“Although I have to admit, I’m not entirely sure why you wanted to tell this to me now.”_

**“Look up.”**

That she did- although she wasn’t entirely sure what she should have been looking for. There was the same star-dusted sky, a distant range of jagged hills, and-

That _was_ it. The Vex were gone, either called back to their master or left behind.

Had Scribe written to her to keep her from being distracted by them?

**“Everyone needs a story every now and then. They help you in more ways than you may realize- and if you’re going after your old friends, you’ll need a few.”**

She let out a sigh as she came to a complete stop, lifting her head to watch the heavens shift from deepest indigo to a dusty blue as the night began to retreat. One by one, the stars followed after the sinking moon as gentle wisps of cumulus began to come into view.

_“That_ is _what I’m doing, isn’t it?”_

By this point, Ellegaard had realized that she had every intention of finding her friends- even the ones she had ended on… Less than ideal terms with. As fiercely as she and Magnus had bickered, ( _especially_ during her last days), she had thought it would make her entirely repulsed towards the idea of actively seeking him out- but here she was, chasing after the memories that had gone to their grave a long time ago. 

It wasn’t what she would have done a couple weeks ago. But death had a way of making the things she had silently longed for into more of a priority.

**“Well, I wouldn’t know. I can’t read your thoughts.”**

Ellegaard sighed and shook her head as the sun slipped over the horizon, a faint smile at her lips. It was time to continue onwards.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It definitely took so much longer to edit this beast, but I wanted to make sure it flowed as well as it possibly could!! ☺️ I thought I had more significant thoughts on this one, but the only end note I had typed in the doc was a midnight "Honk honk honk" apparently!! 
> 
> Off to Boomtown we go, and I hope you have a very happy New Years if your reading this!! 😊


	16. Trial

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Experimentation is the originator of technique.

For all the mental gymnastics required to figure out why she was traveling so far in the first place, it certainly didn’t make the journey any easier for her.

Ellegaard had set off again at the sun’s rising, consulting with her hand-drawn map to confirm that she was, indeed, on the right path towards Boomtown.

(The name itself was enough to raise an eyebrow.  _ Boomtown _ , couldn’t Magnus have come up with something even  _ slightly _ more tasteful?)

If she continued at this rate, with no further distractions or problems from the Vex, then it wouldn’t be entirely unreasonable to hope that she would arrive before noon. Then she would go about the task of finding Magnus, or something that could give her any form of assistance- but that could be worked out when she arrived, and got a good enough chance to assess what she was working with.

If Boomtown and its inhabitants were the way she remembered Magnus to be, she would have her work cut out for her trying to find any semblance of sense within the burning pile of disarray.

By this point, it was no secret that she couldn’t accomplish the ordinary tasks of the living she had perhaps gotten a little  _ too _ used to; the luxury and temporary tranquility of sleep evaded her, leaving nothing but an empty drive in her head to continue onwards. What she hated about the  _ Between _ was that the  _ onwards _ in question was hardly ever clear- only the next couple of steps, which was all she was left to take.

The more wary side of her considered it an absolute nightmare, not having the slightest inclination as to what would happen next; the engineering side of her was too busy mulling over all the unheard concepts this realm brought to her, turning them over in her mind to try and search for the way they all fit together. So all that left was a mishmash of anxious deliberation- which, admittedly, Ellegaard considered a fitting punishment for a dead engineer.

Once the last of the jagged range of hills had passed her by, Ellegaard was left with a few more expanses of plains before her supposed arrival at Boomtown. Tall grasses stretched out for nearly as far as she could see, rippling and bowing gently in what had to be an incoming breeze. The golden light of dawn sent waves of light and shadow across the waking Earth ahead of her, and brought the morning to various creatures spread out amongst the plains. There was the distant mooing of a small herd of cows, an occasional cluck from a chicken or two, the barely-there footfalls of sheep and their young...

She began to wade into the gently swaying grass, barely registering how the tall strands bowed through her own being.

There were certain things she  _ could _ do in this condition- things such as stepping straight through objects that were entirely solid to those who lived, and being able to sprint for as long as she needed. Fatigue certainly wasn’t a physical concept here, barring the moments when the  _ Hunt _ would make itself known and force her to slow down- and as she began to look away from her map, she realized that the only time she could  _ truly _ remember a desire to sleep was when this entire predicament had begun under the tree, with Soren holding onto her.

What had been happening recently, in Scribe’s own words, was that she had been changing.

She supposed that in a way, she was beginning to see it too. The situation with Gabriel back in the Order Hall had been bouncing around in her mind as of late- what had that even been?

_ Back in the crater,  _ she recalled,  _ that hadn’t happened. _ Her entire hand had gone through Jesse’s living being without so much as a flicker into their body.

Ellegaard began to lightly tap her index finger against her chin as she came up to a herd of cows.

Whenever something unexpected occurred in a scientific experiment, it was common practice to perform more trials to reproduce said result. And seeing as Scribe refused to tell her anything more…

She laid her book down next to her feet as she came to stand in front of the largest cow, pulling at the hem on her sleeves.

Ellegaard took a deep breath, (What was filling her lungs at this point? Did the  _ Between  _ even have air?), and focused her gaze on the cow’s own dark eyes.

It’s own unfocused pupils stared right through her, gazing at some distant nothing in the way cows tended to do.

_ If this doesn’t work,  _ she assured herself,  _ then it can be chalked up to an odd outlier of an event.  _ She could continue on her merry way, content that she had gotten at least one satisfactory answer, and pretend that the entire thing was just something her clearly desperate mind had made up.

She raised an arm, her fingers unfurling from the clenched fist they had been in only a moment ago, and began to reach towards the cow.

The very tips of Ellegaard’s fingers brushed the cow’s snout, the lack of sensation causing her to shudder-

-and then she was staring at the spot she had just been standing in, her book laying discarded between tall tufts of grass. Her current point of view was at only about half of her ordinary height, which made the ground seem  _ incredibly _ close; and just in front of her own vision, she could clearly make out the softer end of the cow’s snout.

So much for the whole outlier idea.

She would have sighed if she were aware of her own self, but Ellegaard doubted that being in another being’s consciousness would allow for such a reaction- much less the mind of a cow.

_ Okay, _ she thought to herself. Now it was time to figure out how to get out of the cow’s mind, and back into her own form.

Focusing on the spot where she had been standing seemed like a good enough idea, and for several minutes Ellegaard did just that. The cow itself had clearly gotten bored of whatever it was staring at, though, and she quickly found her field of vision limited to  _ just _ the ground as it bent down to graze.

_ Curses. _

With that option quickly labelled a failure, she was forced to move on to something different- although it was incredibly difficult to figure out what she could even consider trying next. She hadn’t really done anything in particular to get back into her own consciousness the last time, only returning once her temporary confusion had ended- and Gabriel had known none the wiser.

Really, she was thankful that the cow hadn’t chosen to move yet, and remained busy with its grazing. Magnus, had he been here, would have probably doubled over with laughter at the mere mention of her own mind stuck in a  _ cow _ \- and she wouldn’t be able to give him a satisfactory retort if she had lost all awareness of her own body.

Where was her body, anyway?

She was beginning to itch for movement now, searching for some semblance of a sensation that she could call her own. It was rather peculiar; if she focused hard enough, she could almost feel the way the quill’s feather tickled her ear-

-and she was staring at the cow again, watching from her own eyes as it lifted its head and turned away.

Automatically, she lifted a hand to just above her ear and found that the quill was, indeed, still tucked behind it.

Ellegaard immediately felt her heart begin to swell in the way it did when one of her machines sprung to life, and a blooming sense of hesitant pride grew in her chest as she knelt to pick up her book.

It was a successful experiment by far- but she needed to keep moving before anything unsavory could catch up with her.

So she continued through the plains, watching the sun climb higher and transform the dewy morning goldens into brighter earth tones. Every now and then, after consulting with her map, she would extend a finger towards some form of livestock she passed- first she had looked through the eyes of a lamb, then a particularly speedy chicken.

By the time she had reclaimed her book after the third trial, Ellegaard found that she had gotten a faint grasp of how it all worked. Entering another being’s subconscious was as simple as reaching out to lightly touch them, and as far as she knew there were no limits to how long she could watch.

Coming into her own being again meant that she had to make herself aware of it, which was quickly turning out to be the more difficult part of the entire process. But for the time being, it was sufficient enough for her to continue onwards, the distant clamors of blasts beginning to warn her of a close arrival to her destination.

Ellegaard, beginning to grow sick of her own thoughts, chose to flip through Scribe’s previous words as she drew closer to the very edges of Boomtown.

Everything appeared to be something she had already read and deliberated over, right down to the recently used page. She was beginning to consider just shutting the leather cover when, in fresh glistening ink, appeared six simple words:

**“Well, aren’t you the fast learner?”**

Ellegaard hadn’t even realized how eager she was for any form of guidance until she nearly dropped her quill.

_ “Most of it’s making more sense, I suppose.” _

Another blast, slightly more intense in volume, caused her to wince slightly as Scribe replied.

**“I thought you were going to get stuck in that cow.”**

Ellegaard rolled her eyes, the beginnings of a groan sitting on the tip of her tongue.

_ “There’s an entire world of things for you to watch, and you still chose to watch me.” _

**“Oh, naturally. Your faces are incredibly entertaining.”**

She would have loved to press them further, but the sun’s ascent would stop for nobody. It would probably be more beneficial to head into Boomtown sooner as opposed to later, but she had one final question of Scribe before she could accomplish that.

_ “Is there anything else I need to know before I head in?” _

**“You’ve already learned of everything you need right now.”**

By this point, the signature hollers of griefers at work could be heard between frequent explosions. Jagged edges of barely standing buildings stood out against the murky sky overhead, which Ellegaard considered to be a side effect of the dizzying amounts of smoke being produced.

_ “I’ll be sure to keep that in mind, then.” _

Ellegaard steeled herself with a sigh, and closed the leather cover when it became clear that Scribe was finished. As she tucked both book and quill into their resting places, she gave the outskirts of Boomtown a wary glance.

It was a city full of tact, built with nothing but a dangerous game in mind. There would undoubtedly be multitudes of vantage points for attacks, dark corners to prepare traps in, twists and turns designed specifically to perplex.

But it wasn’t the city itself that worried her, much less its living occupants.

Ellegaard had followed what her heart said to do, and reasoned until she could reason no more. She just hoped it wouldn’t lead her into something she couldn’t come out of.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This update was so much later than I wanted it to be, with special thanks to school!! It's also a weensy bit shorter than usual- but I think that with all the new things we learned this chapter, that's probably for the better!! 😊
> 
> Thank you so much for reading!! ☺️ Stay safe, and see you next chapter!!


	17. Vermilion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Red, red, screaming red.

It was safe to say that Ellegaard now understood why she had stayed far away from Boomtown before.

The moment she crossed into the very outskirts of the city, leather bound book resting in the crook of her arm, the entire atmosphere seemed to shift from a bright blue to a smoke-filled murky green; and what had originally been the occasional distant blast was quickly turning into Earth-rattling explosions that became more frequent with every step.

Burnt ashes of earth gave way to piles of stacked buildings in front of her, each in its own state of either rebuilding or demolition. (It was difficult to tell which at this point.) It was a rather erratic arrangement, but steadily repeated in a manner that made it difficult for Ellegaard to distinguish where the city began or ended.

Broad arches of mishmashed materials sprung up in a jarring manner throughout the skyline, silhouetting the entire place with their muted forms- and directly in the heart of the city stood a large tower, dark and strangely out of place considering the rest of Boomtown.

She couldn’t help but shake her head, blinking uneasily against the steady thrumming beginning to rise in the back of her head as her feet carried her further into the town.

Intermittent staircases and bridges stood erect between several hole-ridden homes, managing to serve as _some_ form of direction within the mess- but she quickly reconsidered that thought when she made out the fiery radiance of streams of lava, pouring down from structures she couldn’t even begin to go about describing.

Every now and then, a plume of ashy smoke would rise from somewhere in the winding cluster of houses, followed by a yell and several blurs of excited movement from its sources. Ellegaard watched as griefers of all shapes and sizes bounded from rooftops, leaving nothing but trails of maniacal laughter and the occasional uncontrolled flame that would quickly fizzle out without a sufficient amount of fuel.

There was a part of her that was glad for her relative intangibility- to think of _any_ of them launching projectiles at her own unprepared self, especially with her lacking abilities in griefing...

The entire place was completely _Magnus_ , she had to admit. High stress environments were his calling, so he couldn’t be hard to find here. Although it was hard not to believe that if he had wanted any of them to visit, he would have at least made it slightly more organized, or _safe_ -

The tip of her boot collided with something solid, giving her entire body a solid jolt and nearly startling her out of her own skin with a sudden gasp.

_Circuits, Scribe-_

It had been a long while since they had left a chest for her, and even more so in the middle of her path, but her mind was far too busy for her usual initial observations. She bent down with a jerky movement, grasping the chest’s lid and flinging it open as the shouts and footfalls around her seemed to grow louder.

It’s inner space was entirely empty today, which was an unusual sight- but she had been carrying its contents for a good while now. Ellegaard plucked the almost forgotten quill from behind her ear, and rested it on top of the book as she placed it inside.

One of the surrounding griefers flung a string of obscenities towards another, prompting her to quickly shut the chest’s lid and blink about. She wasn’t sure if it was just Boomtown, or something else, but her heart had begun to race.

Ellegaard began to continue further into the city, clutching her arms to her chest and habitually wincing whenever a blast would rattle too loudly for comfort. It felt like everything, griefers and all, was dancing just out of sight in the corners of her eyes; and even though none of their well-launched attacks were capable of hurting her, her mind didn’t seem to accept that as a plausible reason to rest.

Something felt entirely off about this place, and it was far beyond her usual discomfort with explosives. She needed to find Magnus, and get out of here before whatever the _Between_ brought her reared its ugly head.

While Ellegaard had been in her own mind, slowly pushing onwards into the twisting mess of a city, the movement in her peripheral vision had begun to inch closer. Somewhere in that transition, she realized, it had changed from boisterous blurs of living griefers to a foreboding flap of pale wings- though she couldn’t tell _when_.

Ellegaard’s heart leapt into her throat, and her stomach plummeted.

For just a millisecond, there was nothing but a dreadful stillness.

She stood frozen, muscles locked and breath hitched- and they paused in midair, each unmistakable (yet blurry) figure with it’s cherubic face focused solely on her.

There was a whispered, breathy giggle just in her left ear.

Ellegaard let out a shallow exhale, and tore off into the city.

Behind her, the giggles turned into high pitched shrieks of what she could only assume to be rage. It was a sound she had never heard from the doll-like creatures, and one she hoped she’d never have to hear again. For a moment, she was thankful that she had been able to deposit the book earlier- it meant that she had less weighing her down, and kept her hands free as she fled.

The only problem was that the Vex were _incredibly_ speedy, and even more persistent. Their pale faces continued to dart back and forth as she wove through flaming streets, triumphant shouts of griefers intermingling with shrill screeches of seething anger- and Ellegaard found that no matter how hard she raced against them, they only seemed to be getting closer.

She had been so focused on the threats behind her, that she didn’t notice the masked man winding up his throw from his rooftop perch as she passed him by- so when a spray of fumes and ashy dirt blew just in front of where her foot would have landed, she had no choice but to react instinctively.

Ellegaard shielded her face, jerking backwards as the blast shot outwards.

Its force was nothing but numbness to her, and its blinding heat blew right through her without the faintest sensation of a burn.

The sudden slicing pain just across her stomach was entirely real.

There was a scream of agony that she only faintly registered as being hers, reaching her ears despite the chorus of whispers beginning to grow in their ferocity. She could only respond by curling her arms about her middle sharply, gritting her teeth as her heart pounded hard enough to make her shake.

Hazily, her blurry vision made out a single Vex among what had to be hundreds, its delicate hand lifting a sword to slice at her again. There was a smudge of red, that contrasted against the normally pale blue presence- but everything was too muddled for her to determine if it was blood.

Now that she had been brought to an abrupt stop, masses of pale, minuscule faces were closing in around her, akin to the way a pack of wolves might circle their prey. It was all Ellegaard could do to keep herself from slipping into unconsciousness, and the ground began to tilt as she tried to force herself into action.

If she fell here, it would be the last time. She _needed_ to move.

Clutching the gash across her midsection, Ellegaard flung herself through the encroaching swarm of Vex, their serene faces twisted into seething sneers. There was another, lighter slice at her forearm as she stumbled through, albeit much less agonizing than the one she was most concerned with protecting- and with a final grimace, she pushed through the last couple of Vex and staggered out into the burning street.

The piercing sharpness shooting through her nerves made it painfully obvious that she needed to take cover, and it was the only message her panicked mind could seem to send her- but her pursuers had no intention of giving her that opportunity.

Another herd of griefers rushed past her as she lurched forwards, their yells barely masking the shrieks of what chased behind her. A couple would break off, slipping into smaller nooks and crannies within skeletal buildings to-

_That_ was it.

Her wounds begged for mercy as she burst into a sprint again, but she shoved her own screams into a far corner of her mind- she needed to execute.

As the howls of the Vex began to drift closer to her own ear, Ellegaard leapt into a small pocket between two walls and slid next to a masked girl with pigtails.

The Vex weren’t fooled by her maneuver, and she hadn’t expected them to be- but as the forefront of their charge began to file closer to her, she brushed the very tips of her fingers against the sleeve of the griefer beside her.

Her form as she knew it vanished, although the smarting from the wounds still lingered- and she stared through the masked eyes of another as the Vex halted.

The girl she was looking through couldn’t see them, clearly- and nearly turned her head too far away for Ellegaard to get a glimpse of her pursuers, much less the odd bit of crimson she had caught a glimpse of earlier. But despite her current viewpoint, it was already clear to her that something had changed.

These Vex were different.

Long rivets of bright vermilion ran over the dips and valleys in their dainty figures, sprawling out from their cores and running along every inch of their bodies. They came to a horrifyingly grotesque apex on the faces- which, still, were contorted into a disturbing form of a sneer. It was a horrible marring of their normally angelic exterior, appearing more like they had cracked in some shape or form. Ellegaard was forced to hold back her gasp lest she give herself away.

The Vex, whispering ghostly promises of something she couldn’t decipher, gave a last look over the area before slinking away into Boomtown once more.

-

A long stretch of agonizingly slow time passed before Ellegaard finally slipped back into her own being, forced out once the masked girl had begun to leave her hiding spot. The pain she had felt from the earlier attacks came back full force, slamming into her with such an intensity that she was forced to curl into herself with a sharp gasp.

It could have been either minutes or hours before she finally cracked her eyes open, and began to sit up. The rapidfire blasts hadn’t slowed by any means, and Ellegaard realized that she was only now becoming aware of them again.

A quick glance around her surroundings showed that the Vex had truly dispersed, either having been confused enough by her maneuver to disperse or simply leaving to regroup somewhere else- and with them, they had taken the buzzing in the back of her head.

Ellegaard could hear her thoughts again, although she wasn’t sure how long that would last.

_Foolish. So, so foolish._

What had even been going through her mind when she decided to come here? What made her think _this_ would be a good idea?

She had walked right into a trap with her eyes wide open. The _Hunt_ , whether it was actually here or just working through its henchmen, had been gutting for her even more viciously than she realized, and it had almost _won_ just now-

The slices, on both her forearm and directly at her stomach, began to ache sharply enough for her to cease her chastization of herself and glance downwards at the painful reminders.

Ellegaard grimaced. They must have been bad enough for her to see such an angry scarlet, especially through her clothes- but the peculiar thing about them was that they didn’t have the muddled stains bleeding brought. They were more precise, their edges clearly defined- and the wounds looked like they were of her entire being, clothes and all, like a piece of pottery that was barely holding itself together.

They were exactly what she had seen on the Vex.

Shaking with a violent shudder at the thought of looking like them in any way, Ellegaard turned her gaze away from the pulsating gashes.

She couldn’t handle them right now, not when there was such a large target on her back.

She shifted her position so that she was facing the large gap in the wall she had entered through. Muted light drifted through the opening, gently illuminating the ground under her.

Ellegaard herself began to run through everything her exhausted mind could recall. Would it be worth leaving?

Did she want to give up on finding-

She shook her head, rejecting that train of thought. The first time the _Hunt_ had gone for her, she had decided it fought more viciously when she was close to something it wanted to keep from her. If there was something- or some _one_ \- in Boomtown that she needed to find, then there had to be a way to get to them.

Her mind ran through various bits of information she knew, searching for prevalent things. Just before entering this _deathtrap_ of a city, Scribe had told her she “already learned of everything she needed-” so it was, rather concerningly, left to her to make connections.  
  


Her mind drifted to Gabriel’s words of advice from long ago, Scribe’s story from before somehow managing to follow directly after.

Gabriel had advised her to focus on forging bonds with others when disadvantaged, of course, and the Queen in Scribe’s fable wouldn’t have survived the attacks on her life without having connections throughout the kingdom. Allies and aides were clearly a common denominator here, that was for certain- but she just needed to figure out how that worked into this situation.

Her gaze drifted down her arm, over the burning red slice, past the steadily sewn hem at the end of her sleeve. Outside her sanctuary, the griefers continued their jovial dance with death.

Ellegaard couldn’t ask them where the danger lay, nor could they see what danger was posed to her. She wouldn’t be able to run after them, not in this current state of pain- and they had know way of even knowing her presence.

But as she stared at her fingertips, stinging shooting through her veins, her mind began to pull together the faintest threads of a plan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And here we are, in the eye of the storm..
> 
> 😊 Boomtown was so much fun to write, I got to keep going and looking at little clips from the game!! There was a lot in this chapter that I was so excited to write- but the bits I'm looking forward to the most are a bit further ahead!!  
> (I also updated the tags to fit what happened this time around!! 😊 )
> 
> I hope you enjoyed this chapter if you're reading this, and have a wonderful day! 😊 See you next chapter!


	18. Wait

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes, all we can do is wait. It doesn't make it any easier, though.

Once Ellegaard had managed to collect herself (and her thoughts) enough to attempt movement again, she drew closer to the opening in the wall to peer out.

_Okay._

Her field of sight was incredibly limited. All she could make out was a house, maybe two- but they were too close for her to see anything around or behind them. There were none of the breathy giggles she had come to associate with the Vex, nor was there any movement from them- but by this point, she knew all too well that they hadn’t left.

_That would be too easy, wouldn’t it?_

She sighed, continuing to clutch at the source of aching at her stomach- it would also be too much of a risk to stroll back outside right now, and she wouldn’t be lucky enough to escape them a second time.

The heavier booming footfalls of griefers sounded from overhead as they leapt over roofs. If one of them could just make their way in front of her hiding spot, even for a couple seconds… 

In Scribe’s story, the Queen had relied on her allies to see the danger where she herself couldn’t. Ellegaard decided that she would take that one step further, and take cover under the consciousnesses of those around her to move throughout Boomtown.

It wasn’t as solid of a plan as she would have preferred, but it was all she could do to hold on to it for now. The Vex had already reluctantly withdrawn when she had placed herself into the eyes of the girl from before, proving that they wouldn’t be able to hurt her while she was in that state.

What she needed, however, was a way to get out of here before they came around looking again.

The band of shouting rogues was getting closer to her, it was evident in their voices- maybe, if she could get ready in time…

Ellegaard pried an arm away from her middle to drag herself forwards, until she was leaning slightly out of the wall’s opening.

There were indeed griefers, several running in a direction perpendicular to her only form of exit. Their masks barely did anything to hide sootstained, grinning faces, and Ellegaard was overcome with the overwhelming urge to yell at them to be _careful_ before they got themselves killed.

Instead of feigning that sense of life, she stretched her non-wounded arm until she was certain it was close enough to brush one of them. Whatever she had been planning was tentative at best- in hindsight, Ellegaard realized that maybe she should have gone over it a bit more thoroughly, should have waited longer, shouldn’t have thrown herself into this so suddenly...

But by this point, a figure in a dirty grey hoodie had already drawn too close for her to pass up the opportunity.

Her spectral fingers lightly brushed through the edge of their sleeve, and she was sitting in their mind without any delay.

The griefer she was looking through, as it turned out, was able to survey larger viewpoints for danger quickly enough for them to continue racing through the streets. She wasn’t sure if everybody here was capable of the same thing, but it at least made scanning her surroundings that much easier. Where they searched for an opponent, Ellegaard searched for the dull glint of a ghastly sword, or the sneer of the childlike faces she had come to despise.

For a moment, she thought, it almost seemed as if they had truly vanished. The only movement she saw through the rogue’s eyes were those of living obstacles, who would scatter upon having a blast hurled their way.

Whoever she was occupying clearly deemed the presence too much, however- and as Ellegaard watched them send a lit case of explosives downwards, she noticed that the griefers weren’t the only things fleeing for replaced cover.

There was a flurry of pale movement that accompanied the blast, quickly dispersing into separate streaks that she would’ve never caught had she not been paying attention. The Vex would zip across the street, into the nooks and crannies countless griefers had used to hide themselves- and as Ellegaard followed their movements, she realized that they weren’t the only group. Silent thrums of eager, jittering movement emanated from a dizzying number of hidden pockets in corners and walls, the swarm of her attackers hiding in plain sight.

They had played the same game as her, and squeezed themselves into gaps she would have thought impossible for anything to fit in. But instead of using the smaller pockets to hide, as she had done, they simply waited.

Waited for her to slip by, convinced that their disappearance was good for her- and waiting to land the final blow.

It was a moment that made Ellegaard thankful- being in someone else’s mind meant she couldn’t feel the churning of her own stomach.

If the Vex were laced into the streets so meticulously, then she needed to find out where she was going.

Where would Magnus be?

A part of her was surprised he wasn’t among the thrall of griefers out here. He had always been close to the action, if not the action itself- what happened?

Scribe’s story had mentioned a safe house, she recalled, where her assailants had been forced to retreat. That had been what the Queen was so set on making it to- and to this very moment, she realized, the fable hadn’t misled her. So where did that translate into this?

The griefer had managed to climb onto the steeple of some indistinguishable building- but this one gave the both of them a vantage point that they hadn’t had before. Their consciousness showed her the rooftops of several burning buildings, and their vision stretched out to the murky green horizon. Ellegaard’s own attention drifted to the darker tower, still as jarring as it had been when she first entered Boomtown.

Now that she was able to observe it more, the structure clashed entirely with the rest of the city. It was made out of only one kind of material as opposed to the cluster of different materials the other buildings sported- and, most notably, it was in a better condition than everything else.

Her heart nearly leapt when she realized it was _obsidian_.

Someone had wanted to protect something, maybe even themselves- and there was no safer place to be than a tower made entirely out of indestructible material, even more so in a city where nothing was off limits.

Magnus, however reckless he may have been, was smart enough to at least know that. _That_ was where she needed to go.

However, the one she was temporarily inhabiting seemed to have other plans. They leapt down from their perch to begin in an entirely different direction than what she needed to go in- and back into the midst of the Vex.

Ellegaard nearly groaned. Really, had _none_ of the griefers realized what that tower meant?

Once it became clear that the rogue had no intention of getting anywhere near the towering obsidian fortress, Ellegaard began to rapidly glance around for any form of escape. The Vex continued to thrum just out of sight, their whispers unheard to all ears but her own.

But where there were Vex, there were other rogues- and her vessel was rapidly encroaching on a group racing in the opposite direction, back towards the center of the city.

She knew what she needed to do. But it would need to be quick.

Ellegaard began to probe for her own body, just for a moment- the two slices carved into her gave a sudden shooting throb, reminding her of the body that was at stake if this all went horribly wrong. As the other griefers drew closer, even the Vex themselves seemed to tense in anticipation, almost as if they knew the chance she was about to take.

The pack was right in front of them now, her vessel beginning to veer off of the rooftop to avoid it. It was now or never.

With a sudden gusto, she threw herself back into her own form, gasping for air as the shock of her wounds hit her full force. There was a flurry of wingbeats surrounding her, flashes of serene pale figures mixing with jagged strikes of screaming red.

Her hand jutted outwards, just barely reaching the corporeal body of a man with a dark chesnut beard- and she was off in the blink of an eye, nestled safely into his consciousness and bolting far away from the swing of a sword just behind her neck.

The man she was in had no reason to look behind him, so she could only hope that the Vex were far enough in their wake for her journey to remain safe. That had been far too close of a call for her own comfort.

However dangerous the move had been, its benefits were immediate. Her vessel was incredibly speedy, if not slightly clumsy- but with every leaping stride he took, the army of whispers seemed to fall behind just a little further. Ellegaard wanted to believe it was because he was outrunning them- but that would be too hopeful. It was more likely that they had lost interest in that particular chase, which- she was coming to realize- would be the last.

They were close to the tower, close enough that Ellegaard could make out the row of dispensers that lined the walkway over to it. After only a moment’s hesitation, she slipped back into her own body as the rogue continued through a jump, crossing an arm across her middle again as the bottoms of her boots landed firmly on the walkway.

There was a single moment of nothing but the beating of her own dead heart, eyes darting about wildly as her only source of protection leapt back into the fray. When wisps of giggles failed to reach her ears, and the air around her remained still, only then did she loosen her shoulders.

_The Queen arrived at her destination, safely._ She would need to ask Scribe about that later.

But for now, all she was focused on was the steady tapping of old worn boots that echoed once she had slipped through a dull iron door. It was a noise that was familiarly alluring, in a way, promising her old things she thought she had lost.

The inside of the tower barely illuminated, weak torches masking the various traps that had been littered about the interior. They meant nothing to her- Ellegaard knew who was here before she even laid her eyes on the source of the sound, tired heart beginning to beat only a little faster.

Before she knew it, she was staring right at him.

-

Magnus paced about the obsidian floor, pulling at his gloves and muttering under his breath. The warmer glow of the lava moat a couple feet away would dance over his masked face for a short moment, until he turned around to begin in the other direction all over again. His arms swung idly at his sides, the right glove occasionally dropping a couple particles of a glimmering crimson dust- and he would clasp his hands together behind his back as he clenched his jaw.

He hated this routine.

To be completely frank, he just hated routine in general. It didn’t account for little things that popped up out of nowhere, things nobody planned for. So when they happened, (which they _always_ did), it just left everybody scrambling for an old sense of something that wouldn’t help them fix anything. And once everything was back to normal, the problem was quickly forgotten.

He should know. He had asked countless people what he was supposed to _do_ now, and they had all told him the same thing. Whatever he was feeling didn’t come around often, if even at all- but he was beginning to despise whatever hold it had on him, the way it made his heart drum whenever someone told him to just keep moving forwards.

Jesse had said, between ceremonies and quests, that everyone would probably appreciate help with rebuilding. They had offered to let him start in what they were calling “Beacontown,” even beginning to organize a place for him to stay- but he found it tough to believe that anyone would want his help, being someone who specialized in blowing things to pieces.

Not to mention that it would be hard to trust a fraud with rebuilding your house.

Gabriel, in a few curt words that Magnus loathed for being so unlike those of his old dare buddy, had also said that they needed to focus on repairing the damage and helping where they were needed. Magnus had only nodded- they were already preoccupied with avoiding the heated glares being thrown their way post ceremony- and the two had parted ways without another word.

As far as his old friends went, Gabriel was the only one he had any semblance of contact with. Soren wasn’t around to give him a cryptic song verse of advice- Magnus had heard the way the others spoke about him, fleeing from the storm with his tail tucked between his legs.

_Figures._ “Good old Soren,” he grumbled, narrowing his eyes at his fists. 

Ivor wasn’t on speaking terms with any of them, far as he knew. Not that Magnus blamed him for that, anyway.

And Ellie-

Magnus spun, beginning his circle of pacing once more and clasping his hands behind his back.

So that brought him here, to Boomtown. A part of him snidely remarked that at least nothing about this had changed. The other griefers had wanted to find and dethrone him before, and they sure as heck had no plans on stopping.

He wondered bitterly if they had lost interest in him now that the truth was out, or if that would only make them more determined to see to his demise.

No matter what their motivation was, Magnus found that he couldn’t bring himself to care anymore. Not about griefing, anyways.

He needed to do _something_ \- he just wasn’t sure what.

At first, he had tried to take what little advice he had received to heart. Boomtown wasn’t something that ever needed rebuilding, not when everyone was constantly making sure any significant structures were reduced to rubble. So, true to Gabriel’s word, he went to the only place he could think of that might need his help.

Her city.

Redstonia was… Something, he could give her that. Even in ashes, it was something far beyond what he usually wanted to comprehend. That didn’t seem to deter him from helping, though- and if the other engineers there were disappointed by the Order, they didn’t show it. In fact, they seemed more than glad to instruct him on what to place, and how to make sure it was correct. The girl- an “Olive,” one of Jesse’s friends or something- had stepped into leading the reconstruction, but gave him enough space to work through the buildings on his own.

It was only when he began poking around in whatever was left of her laboratory, his breath hitching with each broken machine he uncovered, that he finally realized he was near his wit’s end.

Ellie- _Ellegaard_ was gone, and nobody was giving a crap. They were all just going about their business, as if they hadn’t lost anything and as if nothing had changed from before. It made him want to scream at the world, at his old friends, until they realized they couldn’t just _do_ that- they couldn’t just go back to whatever fake version of normal they were at before and leave her behind like this. 

Why hadn’t anyone searched for her? Why hadn’t anyone stayed to make sure she could at _least_ pass on peacefully?

Why hadn’t _he_?

Everyone just wanted him to _wait- wait_ for things to get better, _wait_ for everything to heal, _wait_ to see what the future would bring. Magnus far preferred action to waiting- but there was nothing else he could do but pick up the pieces, just like everybody else who did nothing but stall.

Magnus had taken a pinch of redstone dust from the wreckage that day, hardly even realizing what he had done. While it had surely dissipated on his way back, the gleaming specks had left a sort of crimson residue on the fingertips of his gloves- and it was now, within the suffocating silence of his own tower, that he stared at them.

It wasn’t like anybody really _could_ have done anything. The storm had revived itself too quickly for any of them to even register what that meant for who got left behind- and by the time it crossed his mind that she could have left something there after her passing, the only thing he could do was chase after the blasted beast himself; screaming bloody curses at the top of his lungs until his throat was scraped raw.

What ticked him off the most was that he didn’t even have a right to feel this way.

He and Ellegaard had been complete and utter opposites in every way, and that had shown itself painfully. They had _sometimes_ said things to each other that they would both come to regret, which made it all the more painful for Magnus to remember- but when the Order had been together, there was the unspoken rule that they would at the very least always save each other’s behinds. The two of them were a combination of ups and downs, each pulling on opposite ends of the same rope, but at least he could walk knowing she’d keep a skeleton from putting an arrow into his back if he let his guard down.

Then the Order had split up, whatever delicate teetering balance they had shared shattered in the wake. And Magnus had gone somewhere far away to declare himself a king of all things cataclysmic, proudly rebelling from any inkling of order and organization. He had told himself that he would be just fine without all of them- including her- and that his name would speak for itself.

Which meant that the only person left to be angry with was himself.

Magus had blown up everything there was to blow up, until the Earth begged for mercy- and the worst part of it all was that nobody had stopped him. Nobody had been drawn outside to yell at him for all the racket, to holler at him to be _careful._ He had come to Boomtown to establish a city without limits, without rules, without boundaries- and he had gotten it.

He just wished there was someone to stop him before he teetered too far over the edge.

Because he sure was getting close.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And here we are..
> 
> I've been waiting to write Magnus's part since I first started writing this entire fic, and cried multiple times while I edited, but it's _finally_ here!! It also took much longer than I initially wanted, but I'm glad I got to put the extra love into it! 😊   
> (I also got the pleasure of updating the tags for this story too!!)
> 
> I hope you enjoyed this chapter, and I hope you're safe and healthy!! See you next chapter! 😊


	19. Here

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It is only when the storm seems to quell, and the tide pulls away, that we see everything for what it truly is.

Seeing Magnus _right_ there, nearly within arm’s reach, seemed to ground Ellegaard even further into her own position. The adrenaline that had been coursing through her veins for as long as she could remember seemed to all drain away, and left her to double over on herself as the full brunt of her injuries shot through her once again. Her heart slowed into a limp, beating sluggishly with the occasional flutter.

_There you are._

She was here. Everything about herself right now felt wrong, and it had nearly taken everything out of her to get to this point, but she was at least _here_.

With both arms wrapped around her middle, Ellegaard half walked, half crawled over to the other side of the moat. Magnus continued to pace about, his mouth set into a thin line and his brows knotting. His fists would clench every so often, and there was an added roughness to his steps that caused the sound of his boots to echo even further throughout the dark chamber. There was a stroke of familiarity in the way he seemed to glance around- but Ellegaard found that she was having trouble placing it.

Had he been doing this a couple years ago, she and the others would have taken cover from the impending storm of blasts they all knew would come. When he was restless like this, it meant something was going to be receiving the brunt of that energy. So Magnus deliberating never tended to be a positive thing, at least not in the way she knew; he had always said that his best “ideas,” (for lack of a better term), came when he wasn’t thinking at all. Most of the time, that meant whenever he was out terrorizing anything in the immediate vicinity.

But it had been ages since she had been around him, Ellegaard realized, and any mannerisms of his she could recollect were more likely to have changed entirely. Their brief time spent together was in the wake of mass destruction, which meant that there was hardly enough time to do anything other than tear each other apart.

At least with Gabriel, she had immediately been able to tell that something was different. He didn’t normally let his guard down, which was reason enough for her. But Magnus?

She couldn’t trust herself to figure him out in the same way she once could. They had been apart for too long to think it possible, and knowing that brought back the same initial aching she had once thought she could rewire away.

Why _had_ she even thought that was possible?

_It clearly didn’t work for either of us,_ she thought, watching him meander to and fro.

She would have loved to walk with him, but her body clearly wouldn’t allow that to happen. So as Magnus continued his steady gait, Ellegaard sat herself down in the middle of the floor with a heavy sigh. Her old friend- if she even call him that- strode around her, and her eyes continued to follow him.

Bleakly, she wondered why he _wasn’t_ outside, participating in the destruction of the Earth and whatnot. That seemed to have always been an easy fix for whatever ailed him before, and she at least knew that to be constant with him. So why had he locked himself away here?

A particularly sharp sting from her midsection caused her to inhale sharply, drawing her knees to her chest and squeezing her eyes shut with a low groan. Ellegaard had no idea how long she had carried these… Injuries so far, or how long it would be until the pain eased up, but she was quickly growing agitated with the throbbing. It was hard to make out her own thoughts, and the _Between_ had surely prevented plenty of those so far.

By the time she was ready to open her eyes again, she found that Magnus had come to an abrupt stop mid-stride.

He was staring at something, moving his fingertips ever so slightly in the faint glow of the lava with that same look in his eyes. Ellegaard frowned at the unfamiliar gesture, and began to shift herself forwards to get a better view.

_What are you up to?_

The tips of his gloves glistened in the same way her work ones did, always faintly glinting with the tiniest glitters of red that she could never manage to scrub out completely. So that meant…

Redstone. He had gotten it on his gloves somehow, and it had clearly meant enough for him to end up pacing back and forth over it. And that face of his, she could _finally_ recognize:

Magnus would wear that face with her.

It was there in the signature eye roll he’d give her every morning, there in the extra snark he would add to a retort in one of their later bickerings. The stupid little smirk he’d wear when he knew he was right, and the triumphant grin when any of his antics had driven her out of her lab in a frenzy- _every_ single time he had looked at her, that depth had sat just beyond his eyes.

It felt like she had been flung into that miserable tree all over again.

She began to pull at the ends of her hair as she inched herself over to where Magnus stood, still seemingly enthralled by the dust on his fingers. He had relaxed slightly, and mouthed a phrase too gentle for Ellegaard to make out.

That face had been a constant during their _entire_ time of knowing each other- and it made her wish she had gotten to get a good look at him before she slipped away. Would there have been traces of the same person she used to know, watching her take her final breaths? Or, she wondered, had he been in too much shock to do anything other than stare blankly?

There was so much she had missed, so much she was _still_ missing. Being dead was one thing- but watching her own memory die out from the world, without being able to do a thing?

Ellegaard could do nothing but run, learn, and watch- and when that was all said and done, she would repeat it all over again. 

She let out an exasperated exhale, pressing her lips into a thin line as her eyes stung with a wetness she had long thought gone. She had come to sit a mere foot away from Magnus at this point, and tilted her head upwards in a silent plea as a hand drifted upwards, knowing full well it wouldn’t reach him.

It _wasn’t_ fair.

To Gabriel, to Jesse, to Soren, to Ivor, to _Magnus_ \- she was gone. And she was forced to watch them grieve just out of arm’s reach, trapped between a distant dream and waking up. It made her want to hurl something, or scream- anything to tell them she was still _here_.

_Eventually_ , she thought bitterly, _they would learn to move on._ She would be trapped too far in the past to be anything other than an occasional mention every now and then, if someone remembered- and as selfish as she knew it was, every part of her wanted anything but that.

The _Between_ couldn’t be all there was to her now. Surely _something_ would change, and she wouldn’t have to stay trapped with the pain that seemed to await her at every turn- and she wouldn’t have to watch the sun continue to rise and fall without her.

Or maybe she would get lucky, and the _Hunt_ would finish her off before she could see that happen.

Magnus, strangely enough, had sunk down to sit on what Ellegaard imagined was an impossibly hard floor. It couldn’t have been comfortable, not in the slightest- but there he was, head propped up on a hand as he gazed off into nowhere in particular.

He was so close that it hurt now, a kind of aching that she was beginning to realize as residing inside of her more frequently. And, she realized as he continued to stare at the sparkling dust on his fingertips, he was probably experiencing the same.

_I’m sorry._

Ellegaard’s breath hitched as she turned herself slightly to face him, and rested her chin on her knee in a fashion that mirrored his own.

It would be unfair of her to ask him or anyone else to wait for her, and she knew it. But all the knowing in the world couldn’t stop her from yearning to be seen, to be spoken to, to be _held_. Ellegaard wanted to hear someone say her name, directly to her, for them to be able to hear her reply- and she wanted to be able to feel the way her fingertips tingled when a misfiring circuit zapped her, or the even how her back hurt when she had been hunched over for too long. 

She wanted to feel something other than agony, and she wanted to walk without fear of being stalked at her every turn.

But every day in this wretched realm kept her farther away from that.

A jolt of said aching coursed through her once again, catching her off guard and forcing her to place a non-wounded arm behind her in an attempt to steady herself.

It bumped against something solid and smooth, a soft _thunk_ announcing its arrival.

This was the first time Scribe had initiated contact in the company of someone else, even if that company wasn’t aware of her. Quirking an eyebrow, she took a quick glance over to Magnus; his own eyes had far wandered to somewhere else, and he hadn’t moved enough to suggest anything different.

That meant the chest was only in the Between. Which, barring herself and the _Hunt_ , meant it was one of the only things that had managed to accomplish that- was it something she could bring to Scribe?

Despite her agitation, her best course of action right now would be to talk to them. But it didn’t stop her brows from knotting as she reached inside the chest, partially from lingering pain and partially out of continued frustration.

On a newer empty page, further back in the book, read:

**“And here you are.”**

Ellegaard wasted no time in scribbling back, frowning at how messy her handwriting was becoming. It didn’t help that her dominant hand was on the same arm the Vex had managed to slice- but there was one thing in particular she needed to make sure she asked before everything else.

_“But why am I here, Scribe?”_

**“Because you wished to see your friend, I imagine.”**

Ellegaard pressed her mouth into a thin line. Just in front of her, Magnus shifted his weight so that his feet were dangling off of the edge of the moat.

_“You know that’s not what I meant. Why am I_ _here_ _, Scribe? What kind of punishment is this to where I can’t interact with anything other than myself? Why can’t I go home?”_

She finished the flurry of questions with a pointed jab of her quill, slamming the last question mark into the paper. Scribe themselves remained silent for at least a solid ten seconds- and around her, the lava only continued to bubble.

**“Despite what you believe, you being here isn’t the decision of a higher being, nor is it your punishment. From the moment you took your dying breath, your fate was sealed.”**

_What does that even mean?_ Ellegaard narrowed her eyes, mildly confused.

_“So I was basically singled out for this.”_

**“I’m afraid so.”**

Her shoulders slumped as she turned her attention back towards Magnus, who was beginning to tap his fingers against the floor with a steady _thump, thump, thump._ The worn leather of the heel of his boot echoed the sound, swinging against the side of the floor’s sudden drop with a jittery sharpness.

_You’re very fidgety, as always_ , she thought.

Very slowly, Ellegaard pressed the book to her chest with her injured wrist still aglow, and used her other arm to slide herself over to the empty spot next to him. Only when she had properly situated herself did she look back to the page she was on.

_“So, I’m going to assume that the Hunt is what marked me.”_

**“That assumption would be correct.”**

Her eyes drifted downwards to her midsection, gently roving over the jarring scarlet gash that ran just above where her navel would be. It, along with her wrist, had kept the same appearance as when she had checked them before; same precise edges, same red…

_..And still no blood,_ she remarked to herself.

_“I think there are more pressing matters right now. These-”_

She paused for a moment, searching for the words to describe them.

_“-wounds shouldn’t be here, correct? I thought I wasn’t affected by anything in life.”_

**“You still aren’t. The Vex themselves share the same, as I’m sure you’ve noticed- consider them a small taste of what the** **_Hunt_ ** **ultimately seeks to accomplish.”**

From beside her, Magnus seemed to have willed himself back into action. He pulled himself up off of the sharp ledge where the floor ended, steadying himself with a free gloved hand- and he was back to the same pacing routine he had been in when she arrived. Ellegaard frowned; this was much more repetitive than she remembered him being able to tolerate.

Scribe, meanwhile, had continued writing.

**“They’re wounds to your entire being, not just your physical one. What you see runs much deeper, into your very existence itself in fact- which is something that the living realm couldn’t do to you.”**

_So that would be why they hurt so much…_

Ellegaard narrowed her eyes, glancing back down at the wounds warily before resuming her writing.

_“So what does that mean for me?”_

Scribe’s reply was immediate.

**“To be frank, it means your time here is very, very limited.”**

Those were the last words she wanted to hear. It felt like their impact hurt more than the wounds themselves.

But as she tore her eyes away from her oracle of doom, and watched Magnus jitter all the more restlessly, something seemed to make up its mind within her, if even tentatively.

Ellegaard picked up the quill again.

_“Then I’ll need your help, Scribe. You see things I can’t. Tell me what I need to do.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This took an unbelievable amount of time to edit, aaa! I was almost afraid I’d never finish! 😊  
> It also took a bit of technical tweaking to make sure everything was delivered in the best way! (I’m sorry, Ellegaard-)
> 
> I hope you enjoyed this chapter!! ☺️ See you next time, and stay healthy!


	20. Torch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes, all that is needed to spark an idea is the smallest bit of light.

Ivor, quite frankly, was cold. Incredibly so, in fact.

Scowling to himself, he pulled the ragged tatters of cloth someone had called a blanket even closer to his chin. The dim flickers of a dying torch on the wall served as his only source of light, its flames long dead and leaving a persistent residual glow on the burnt ends of wood. The embers were too soft for him to even begin replenishing his normal stock of elixirs and potions- which meant that sleeping, (or attempting to, at least), seemed to be his only option.

As chilly as he was, he supposed it was better than nothing. Jesse had been kind enough to set aside a small plot of land for him, just in front of what was quickly becoming the new Order Hall. He had never considered himself an architect, not by any means- but he could at least pride himself in constructing a house that was to his own liking.

(It was supposed to be a skull, he told himself. But because he was short on stone bricks at the moment, all he had right now was a vague structure with nearly as many holes as his blanket.)

For a while, he had considered returning back to the Farlands. It had certainly seemed like the more logical choice, far away from the scrutinizing glares of the people who _hadn’t_ forgotten- and he could live out the rest of his life in peace, escaping the public eye.

But Jesse had insisted that there was something here for everyone, despite Ivor’s initial protests. For whatever reason, they seemed more than willing to include him in whatever new beginning they were writing; so out of curiosity, (and a particular aversion to the isolation of his old lair), he decided to stay.

Just to see how this would all play out.

Ivor shivered, curling his knees into his chest as a particularly chilling gust of wind howled through gaps in the wall.

Being in Beacontown meant that he had no choice but to watch the daily happenings, something he was getting more used to with each passing day. Watching the world churn around him had always been easier before the big reveal, and it was an even more natural task for him now that he carried the wavering guilt on his back.

He had gotten to see Jesse, along with the rest of those he had once despised, come into their new roles. They suited them, all of them- it was almost impressive to watch them grow, although he would never tell them that.

The New Order had traveled to some far corner of the world, Jesse promising that they’d be back the following morning- it was a jungle temple, or something like that. The cloak of night must have been too good of an opportunity to pass up, not that he blamed them- over the past few weeks, they had been discussing different strategies for avoiding the numerous traps they all knew would be there.

So while they had been off on their numerous expeditions, Ivor took it upon himself to clean up what was left of the past. It was only fair- and the best thing he could do, other than build his own residence anyway.

Somehow, he had managed to get ahold of Gabriel, who readily agreed to aid him in recalibrating the amulet. Ivor hadn’t been expecting the man to even be around, much less respond to his query; but that had always been Gabriel. He couldn’t just walk away from anyone who needed his help- even if that someone had wanted him dead only weeks ago. He was too heroic for his own good, and Ivor had always loathed that aspect of him- a part of him had even hoped that Gabriel wouldn’t show up, just so that he could justify the lingering resentment he felt towards him.

But the day had come, and with it Gabriel- marching in with his armor gleaming, head held high, as if nothing had even fazed him. As much as Ivor had wanted to wipe the determined look off of his face, they both had a job to do.

And then that blasted amulet had lit up, just long enough to catch Gabriel’s eye- and just long enough for him to look to Ivor for answers.

It was difficult enough for him to come to terms with the fact that she was gone, much less that _he_ had been the cause of it. So it had been easy for him to blow it off as a small miscalculation with the amulet itself- and even easier to convince Gabriel as such, as much as the warrior had longed to believe otherwise.

But all this time to himself in Beacontown was beginning to chip at his resolution, and he found it gnawing more at his thoughts with each passing day.

Ivor turned his back against the wall with a weary sigh, pulling the thin cover closer to himself as the wind began to die down.

Tomorrow, the order would return from their expedition. And he could busy himself with whatever that would bring.

The torch on the wall only continued to flicker, its flames long squashed into a weak glow.

-

Scribe had begun writing before Ellegaard even had the chance to finish her last request, calling her attention to the bottom of the page with their signature scrawl. Every now and then, she would send a questioning glance over to Magnus, whose pacing seemed to have slowed for the moment.

It was difficult to see him like this. But she would rather be here for it than resigned to whatever was waiting for her outside.

Now she just needed to decipher what all of this meant.

**“If I’m truly going to help you, you need to follow each instruction that I give you with utmost precision. There can be no mistakes, no deviations, no questioning my direction. Understood?”**

Ellegaard frowned slightly. A figure of unwavering authority was far from what she would normally trust, especially if her immersion in literature had taught her anything about its effects.

Scribe seemed to understand her hesitation, or at the very least was able to sense it. They began again.

**“It will lie to you. It will show you things you don’t even realize your own desire for, and it will place them just within your reach. You don’t have to accept my help, not by any means- but know that you will be severely vulnerable without it.”**

Ellegaard finally lowered her own quill.

_“And you’ll answer whichever question I bring to you, as clearly and as truthfully as possible?”_

**“However I am able.”**

The more she contemplated it, the more she wanted to delve a little further into their intentions before placing all of her trust in them. This realm had already done a great deal of misleading her- but it didn’t mean that she couldn’t take Scribe’s advice. What she _really_ needed was a way to decipher how they got the information they did.

After a couple minutes of nothing but silent contemplation on her part, Ellegaard finally decided to press them a little further.

_“Well, the story you told me before- the one about the Queen. It was almost uncanny how accurate it was with everything that happened here- is it the future that you base your advice to me off of?”_

**“Quite the opposite, actually. I am only aware of what I see before me, and what I’ve seen before. The Queen, although similar to you in many ways, was her own person- who lived and died long before you ever came to be. What you find after eons of watching and recording is that history is nothing more than different scenarios of the same conflicts. People like you often find themselves searching too vigorously for an answer that’s already been discovered.”**

That made sense. She supposed there would be some semblance of truth within things that had already happened before.

A low tune emanated from another portion of the tower, momentarily calling Ellegaard’s attention away from the book. Magnus had gone off to some other chamber, whistling some indistinguishable number that she could faintly recollect if she tried hard enough- and she was suddenly struck with the sinking feeling of despair now that he had gone elsewhere.

Wincing as her wounds made themselves known with her heightened awareness, Ellegaard twisted herself around and shakily climbed to her feet.

She had all intentions of returning to Magnus, and even managed to take a couple steps in the direction he had gone off in- but a sudden flurry of words caught her eye, just on the beginning of a new page.

**“You can’t stay here. You need to leave.”**

Furrowing her brows, Ellegaard glanced between the book and the hall she had only begun to traverse down. Being around Magnus was the closest she had come to feeling like everything was alright. He _felt_ like home- and she hadn’t gotten to spend nearly as much time around him as she did Gabriel.

Did she really want to go back to braving the horrors of the _Between_ by herself again?

She crossed an arm across her middle, contorting her brow as Magnus’s whistling drew further away. The floor was beginning to churn again, in that way she continued to hate- and the worst part was that she couldn’t tell if it was because of her injuries, or the monstrosity that she had come to loathe more with each passing day.

Leaving Magnus would hurt more than anything she had experienced thus far- she wasn’t sure when she’d be able to see him again.

Steeling herself against the increasing throbbing at her middle, Ellegaard dragged herself away from the darker hallway and trudged back towards the entrance. As the faint tune of Magnus’s whistling grew more distant, eventually vanishing altogether, the only thing she found she could do was leave behind her well wishes and pray that he would be alright until she could return.

Being in the _Between_ wouldn’t allow her to do much else.

By the time Ellegaard had made it out of his tower, the disquietude from inside had settled into a weak thrum- which, to her dismay, meant that it had most likely been caused by something out of her own control.

It looked like she had been right to heed Scribe’s warning, although it made no sense as to how it had decided to try again- even if only for a brief moment. She couldn’t help but think that she normally had more time in between encounters, which was… Worrisome, to say the least.

The sky had been considerably murky when she entered Boomtown, but that was nothing compared to its appearance now. An expanse of darkness had stretched itself from east to west, coating the city in a shroud of night that did little to dissuade its inhabitants from their usual activities. As Ellegaard crossed the beaten stone arch that led to Magnus’ sanctuary, bursts of flame would erupt in various points amongst shadowed buildings- which brought both blooms of warm light and the occasional chorus of shouts.

_When had it the sun set?_

Ellegaard frowned, shifting the book in her arms until it came to rest in its ordinary spot where she could see it. It felt like it had been _ages_ since she walked into Boomtown, oddly enough- though, she supposed getting attacked by Vex would be enough to make anyone forget when they had entered.

What she hadn’t forgotten was the way they sneered, or the guttural shrieks of excitement that had resounded once they struck her. Even as she wove her way through the darkened streets, eyeing the nooks and crannies she expected them to dart out of at any moment, she couldn’t shake the dreadful feeling that sat in the pit of her stomach- and the two gashes her first journey sustained certainly had no intentions of easing up. Each step seemed to stir up a sensation even more vile than the last, leaving her to move at a pace much slower than she would have liked.

Scribe remained silent all throughout her journey back through Boomtown, and it wasn’t until she had successfully breached the final border that she picked up her quill to write again.

_“Scribe, just out of curiosity- how long have I been in Boomtown?”_

**“Three days.”**

She nearly dropped the book entirely. _Three days_ \- That couldn’t be right.

_“There’s no way it could have been three days. I would have noticed the sky getting darker at least twice, even with all the smoke.”_

**“I think you’ll find that time is a fickle concept for you right now.”**

Oh, of _course_ it was. If time was odd for her, she didn’t even want to think about what else she might have missed.

Ellegaard came to a stop in the same field she had proudly experimented in three days prior, (apparently), finally resting atop a small incline in the normally flat expanse with her book and quill strewn about beside her.

She needed a moment to breathe- and breathe she did, until the cool indigo sky began its daily transition into the warmer rose and apricot hues she had seen so many times before. As dawn’s light fell in gentle waves onto the face of the Earth, Ellegaard finally gathered the will to pick up the book once more.

It took her a solid minute to collect her thoughts enough to write- and it was with a weary hand that she wrote:

_“Is there even a way out of the Between?”_

For a moment, there was nothing but silence. Ellegaard was beginning to fear that Scribe’s attention had been called elsewhere, and glanced around her for the chest that would signal the end of their communication- but their words came eventually, viscous and gradual in the way honey might settle into a pot.

**“There may be. There may not be. It’s beyond any of my own knowledge.”**

_“So in the thousands of years that you’ve watched over this world, and the numerous people you said have been in the_ Between _before- nobody’s ever made it out?” _

**“Nobody.”**

Her eyes widened, a cool wave of shock jolting through her nerves. The thought of hundreds, if not thousands of people, each subjected to the same agonizing wait as the world forgot them…

Everything was moving too fast. Her heart was pounding in her ears now, breath hitching with every beat- she didn’t _want_ things to end like this.

Not when she had already seen what she was missing.

With a shaky hand, and a trembling quill, Ellegaard wrote:

_“That’s not comforting in the slightest. Everything I do may as well be futile.”_

It had been a dreadful sentence to even write, much less think- but for all the emotional baggage it brought along in its barely legible letters, Scribe had a reply speedier than she expected.

**“Not quite. You’ve survived long enough for things to begin happening differently than they have before- and despite what you may think, you haven’t been put to rest in everybody’s mind just yet.”**

That gave her sufficient reason for pause, allowing her to force several deep breaths into her lungs. If that meant someone would have sufficient reason to believe her to be… Well, _not_ dead, then…

It felt as if her mind had sprung to life again, and Ellegaard began to wish for one of her larger whiteboards where she could at the very least diagram a thought process out. Based on what she had seen already, there had to be at _least_ two options…

Buzzing with theory after theory, she could hardly keep her hold on the quill steady enough to reply- this time with words straightened and upright.

_“Who, then?”_

**“An old friend.”**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We made it to Chapter 20!! I can hardly believe it!! 😊 Thank you so much for reading along with me for this long, and for watching as I try to bring this whole thing to life!!  
> I _definitely_ cried crocodile tears when I wrote this, but I'm really happy with how this chapter came out!! Thank you so much for reading, and see you next chapter! 😊


	21. Clock

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Time is such a fickle thing.

As it turned out, immediately interrogating Scribe put her no closer to finding out the identity of this supposed “old friend.” So that left Ellegaard with process of elimination. (Thankfully, one of the more enjoyable mind games for her.)

As much faith as she had in Jesse, and their friends, they didn’t quite fit the criteria of being a longtime acquaintance- _circuits_ , she had only met them when the world was in danger- so that immediately ruled out the entire New Order.

Try as she might, she couldn’t particularly imagine anyone from Redstonia being distraught enough to lament over her. There was always Calvin, of course, ever the diligent assistant- but that didn’t seem likely. If anything, he was probably more focused on reorganizing whatever was left of the city.

Ellegaard frowned as she climbed to her feet, stretching her limbs more out of habit than necessity and wincing at the jolt of pain from her gashes. She hoped Redstonia’s citizens were at the very least able to start fresh, and that the Order’s mistruth hadn’t hurt them too badly.

Picking up her leather book and tucking the quill into its usual resting place, she began off towards the direction of the rising sun. The sky was streaked with youthful pinks and oranges, blending into a color that made her realize just how clouded the atmosphere in Boomtown had been- and the plains seemed to be just as busy as they were the previous trip through them.

With the Redstonians eliminated, that left her to most reasonably conclude that it _had_ to be a member of her Order- but this was where it got tricky. From what she had seen already, they seemed to be in their own separate bubbles- and resting in someone else’s consciousness still meant that she _couldn’t_ see the whole picture. So unless there was some secret ability to read minds- which, admittedly, she couldn’t even fully dismiss at this point- Ellegaard was still stuck making sense from what little she had gathered.

Magnus hadn’t left Boomtown, at least not to her knowledge. A familiar pang of hurt shot through her as she continued in the direction opposite to where he was, turning her back on the one she had worked so hard to find. He was certainly… _Off_ , but Ellegaard doubted that Scribe would give her the key to his importance as she walked away- especially when they had seemed so adamant on her leaving.

Could it be Soren?

That gave her sufficient reason for pause, and she tugged lightly at her sleeve as she stared at the unearthly cut it hadn’t managed to hide. He hadn’t shown himself _anywhere-_ and judging by the relative lack of gossip in Beacontown the last time she had been there, that perception was at least correct.

She couldn’t rule him out, that was for certain. But it was hard to consider him a part of the equation, especially when she knew so little of his whereabouts. She would have to set that theory to the side for now.

That left Gabriel, and Ivor. Both of them had seen her portion of the amulet light up when they were back in Beacontown, which immediately made them primary contenders in her mind. What that meant was that there _had_ to have been enough doubt in at least one of their minds for them to ruminate over it further.

Raising both eyebrows, Ellegaard shifted the book to her front and plucked her quill from behind her ear. After swirling the feathered tip against her chin, she found her writing hand coming to a stop just before the nib could brush the parchment.

Gabriel seemed like the more logical choice. Ivor’s resentment towards the Order included _her_ \- and surely that meant he would be content to let sleeping dogs lay.

...Right?

Now she was curious, unbearably so. It took her barely any time to write:

_“Is it Ivor?”_

**“There you go.”**

By this point, her excitement in finding some form of hope far outweighed her surprise; and her now feverish scrawling seemed to only amplify that.

_“Then what do I need to do? Where do I go to find him? What will he be able to do?”_

**“Slow down, slow down. As of right now, I’m afraid, he’s going to be unreachable for the foreseeable future.”**

Her shoulders fell. Of _course_ he would go and pull a Soren.

_“Well, why is that? Where can I find him when he_ is _reachable again?”_

**“Beacontown.”**

Her mouth straightened into a thin line, her eyes narrowing. She had been in Beacontown what- three times now? How many times had she walked right past someone who could have held the key to her escape?

_“And you didn’t tell me the last time I was there?”_

**“Seeds of doubt take time to sow, and even longer to begin growing. Even if I had told you about his doubts during your time in Beacontown, he would have sooner considered it a trick of the mind instead of anything else.”**

She sighed, tearing her eyes away from the page for the time being. It made sense, she supposed- but it didn’t make her any less anxious. If she didn’t know how long Ivor was going to be unreachable, as Scribe had said, then that only brought her closer to what she imagined to be certain doom.

_“Well, where is he going? Is there any way I could follow him?”_

**“He’s currently heading off somewhere with Jesse, and the rest of that little troupe. I highly doubt you’d be able to catch up to them by the time they locate what they’re looking for.”**

_“You know, that only gives me more questions than answers.”_

For one, she could hardly wrap her mind around the fact that Ivor had _stayed_ around the New Order. She had been expecting to make some unfathomable journey to the corners of the Earth to even get a _clue_ as to where he had gone.

Perhaps he was changing, just like herself- although Ellegaard certainly hoped it wasn’t to the degree that she seemed to be facing.

And, now that she mulled over it more, if Scribe was able to at least tell her that much…

_“Scribe. You said that you see everything that goes on, correct?”_

Not waiting for a reply, she added:

_“Would you be able to share certain details with me?”_

**“To every extent that I am able, yes.”**

A new vigor coursed through her veins as she lightly tapped the quill’s feather against her chin again. Why hadn’t she asked them _before_?

**“It doesn’t mean that you should pay any less attention, however.”**

Rolling her eyes, she deftly flicked the page over to begin anew.

_Well, of course I wouldn’t._

Ellegaard continued through gently undulating grasses, eyes roving gently over the ripples of rising sun that were cast upon the Earth’s surface. It seemed like she had the plains largely to herself, today- the various livestock she had honed her skills on before were nowhere to be found, the occasional moo reaching her ears from some further stretch of land.

There was a note of warmth in the way the daylight kissed the land today, even if she wasn’t able to feel it on her own skin. And, for one of the first times since her death, Ellegaard was thankful that she at least still got to see it- even if it had the potential to be her last.

Lightly tugging her right arm towards her chest, Ellegaard absentmindedly traced the outline of the smaller gash with her thumb. Both it and the slice marring her midsection seemed to have died down in pain intensity, if only slightly- and she found that she couldn’t tell if it was because she had already begun to block out the jarring feeling, or if they truly were beginning to heal.

_Far too early to tell, anyway._

They certainly seemed to look the same, strikingly lucid alarm bell reds shaking her out of whatever dreamlike state she always felt she was in.

She had only just breached the final strands of gold-painted grass when she realized she had no idea how long she had even been like this. There were moments that stuck out so clearly, that she was convinced they had only happened yesterday despite knowing better- and there were other occasions that she found she could hardly even recollect, feeling more like a dense fog between two other memories. Struck by a sudden fierce curiosity, she donned her quill again.

_“Scribe,”_ she wrote, _“how long have I been in the_ Between _?”_

**“A couple months now. Nearly five, I'd say.”**

...Oh, _no._ That _couldn’t_ be right.

_“There’s_ _no_ _possible way it’s been that long. It only felt like a couple weeks tops for me.”_

**“I’m not quite sure what else to tell you, then.”**

The notion itself was enough to sink her back into her thoughts for what had to be a solid twenty minutes, (though she couldn’t even be sure of _that_ interval anymore), and by the time she had even remotely begun to accept it Ellegaard found herself at the edges of the same forest the Vex had tried to trick her into before.

Turning sharply, she began to walk the perimeter of the now dull oak trees. _Months-_ had she lost track of time that easily? She could have sworn that the amount of sunrises she had seen couldn’t have been _that_ many.

...Then again, Scribe _had_ told her she was in Boomtown for three days, which already meant that the sky was too muddled for her to make out any of the celestial timekeepers she would normally rely on. And it would be incredibly easy not to pay attention to the time when her life was at stake, which- now that Ellegaard thought on it more- had been nearly every day that she could remember here.

It didn’t make the feeling any less disorienting, though, and it made her wish she had thought enough to begin recording her days back when this all started. Maybe at least she could have kept track, and noticed that something was off... 

Finally gathering the coherency to write again, Ellegaard continued alongside the woods as she managed to scrawl a single word:

_“How?”_

Scribe’s reply flowed onto the page immediately, in a fashion that almost made her think they were waiting for her to continue.

**“I’ve told you before. This is the** **_Hunt’s_ ** **realm. It will manipulate it as it so pleases- or, at least, your perception of it.”**

Ellegaard had begun to raise her quill, in order to inquire further, but they continued almost immediately.

**“Time is one and the same, across all dimensions and realms. Say, for example, that a fire is started both in the realm you know and the Nether, both flaring to life in the same moment. While both fires technically started at the same time, the living dimension and the Nether are wildly different in their concepts of it.”**

Unconsciously, Ellegaard nodded. She and the Order had _certainly_ ruined their fair share of clocks traveling through the Nether, the dainty hands spinning themselves awry beyond repair. (Ivor had even banned them from bringing the devices altogether, at one point.)

**“For those in the realm you call home, the time might be recorded- that’s because there’s a system, and one that all beings adhere to whether they know it or not. Even the undead themselves know when their time on Earth has begun, and when it ends.”**

It was a little strange, admittedly, to think of every living (and nonliving) thing following unspoken rules. Ellegaard couldn’t help but think Soren would be fascinated with that knowledge.

**“But the Nether has none of that. There’s no system of sunrise and sunset, no reminders from your surroundings that you need to shelter for the night. Time is both finite and infinite there- and if it has no boundaries, and no guidelines, can we even really say that it exists at all if there is nobody it exists for?”**

_“I suppose not.”_ She quirked an eyebrow.

**“Exactly. So unless someone is in a position to see both fires roar to life-”**

_Someone like you,_ Ellegaard thought to herself.

**“-there is truly no way to call the two equal in age.”**

_“So I guess that makes the_ Between _just like the Nether in that sense,”_ Ellegaard added. _“Although I can see the living realm, and the time it adheres to…”_

**“...you yourself aren’t subject to those rules,”** Scribe finished, their writing slipping just after her last words when she faltered.

_“So, just out of thought than anything else- if someone were able to bring a clock in here, would it spin?”_

**“Not exactly. It would ebb and flow, speeding in some moments and barely moving in others.”**

...Which would explain why her memory had grown so spotty, her concept of time hardly faring any better. Ellegaard let out a breath she hadn’t even realized she had been holding, pressing the book’s leather cover shut and looking onwards. The jagged tops of worn, dark hills greeted her as she made her way through the narrow ridges in between, tugging on her sleeve once more.

She needed to keep moving.

-

There’s no need to rush. 

Ever so slowly, beneath her feet, it will always follow.

It will let itself slip further back, and watch her continue onwards. It will follow, never close enough to touch- not just yet.

It is growing impatient, aggravated. It can sense each footstep, taste each agonized breath laced with the panic it so desires- the fear it so deserves. She belongs to it. It should reap what it’s sowed so meticulously.

But still, it waits. The pieces will fall into place.

It’s only a matter of time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Patience..._
> 
> When I started this chapter, I had pretty much no idea where it was going to go- but I'm actually really happy with how it turned out! 😊 Thank goodness for outlines!!  
> I hope you enjoyed this chapter, thanks so much for still reading along with me! I hope you're safe and healthy, see you next chapter!! 😊


	22. Blur

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everything begins to look the same when one loses focus. Our surroundings often have a way of blending together when we least expect it.

In the coming days- or weeks, Ellegaard couldn’t put a finger on it- were just as Scribe had said, both lagging and racing at the same time. She began to feel restless, bounding from place to place with no specific goal other than to _keep moving._

At first, she had nearly returned to the Order Temple _again_ \- but she ended up blowing straight past it without so much as a blink of an eye. In fact, she had been dreadfully close to returning to that same fateful stump of a tree she had been away from for so long; it felt like ages since she had last sat under it, and she had a strong urge to just sit there and let the world move around her as she rested.

Her logical side had gotten the better of her, though. Ellegaard knew full well that going back to the way things were before would only make her a sitting target for whatever would come next; the _Hunt_ had been getting increasingly aggressive with its attacks on her, and it wouldn’t be the same way it had all been before.

She doubted it would pass up the opportunity to take her without so much a fight- and if she tried to evade it by staying in the same spot, it would likely find some way to bring itself to her.

So that meant she had begun to meander about, with no real destination in mind. A part of her wondered if this was how Ivor had felt, wandering from place to place- although in her case, she at least had the half-presence of Scribe to give her a small sense of company.

After they had told her of Ivor’s… Temporary absence, Ellegaard decided that she would pass her original stump by before heading off in a direction parallel to that of Beacontown. She wasn’t close enough to make out her old resting spot, not by any means- but heading past it struck her with a bittersweet sense of years having gone by, even if Scribe had said it was only a couple months. It already felt like it had been ages since she woke up under what was once a sheltering oak tree, dreadfully confused and already unaware of what was waiting for her.

And that had been merely the beginning of this entire mess.

She made her way towards the forests she already knew, and wove around what she could only assume to be an unexplored section of the now relatively faded map she had drawn so long ago. There were deep ridges gouged into the Earth, which she found herself able to leap over without any problems- and she would tread past rivers, watching the reflections of the stars distort in the rippling water and waiting for the day she would see her own again.

Some days, she would find herself in a jungle with all shades of green- from emeralds to ferns, and ferns to deep olives that danced over a muddy ground- and on others, she would find herself amongst smaller, secluded villages nestled next to mountains.

Much to her own dismay, the gashes that had been inflicted by the Vex back in Boomtown refused to concede- and with each step she took, they seemed to only grow more vivid. 

(That was a concept she was hardly even able to deem possible, with how bright they had been when she first received them. No kind of wound she _ever_ encountered had looked like that.)

It was getting more and more difficult to tell if the burning sensation they brought was easing up, or if she had just gotten more acclimated to it; but Ellegaard found it easier to disregard them so long as she remained in motion.

As she began to move about more, she found that the Scribe’s chest would appear less; exchanged instead for longer periods of silence, during which Ellegaard would move about freely with the book clasped shut in her arms. The intervals of quietude gave her plenty of time to think, which she appreciated fondly- and upon occasion, she would lightly jot down her own observations beneath Scribe’s neatly penned handwriting.

Sometimes, they were smaller:

“ _The wound on my wrist hurts more today.”_

And sometimes, they were slightly more urgent:

_“It felt like the ground was slithering again- note to move faster.”_

On one occasion, as the sun stole away behind the horizon and stowed its chariot of light behind a line of clouds, she had penned a note to Scribe as she passed through a field of moonlit daisies that would turn their heads slightly in the incoming breeze.

_“What are they doing now?”_

Luckily, they seemed to immediately know who she was referring to.

**“The New Order is in an entirely different world right now. And before you ask,** **yes** **\- that includes Ivor.”**

There were… Other worlds? Her eyes widened, mouth ajar slightly. That was… Incredible.

_“Well, what is it like?”_ Nothing like hers, she hoped silently.

**“Far above the ground, amongst the clouds and nestled between the sun and moon.”**

Her eyes widened. That was _nothing_ like she could have even remotely conjured within her own mind.

_“That’s fascinating- how did they wind up there?”_

**“Sometimes a small discovery- such as one gateway, for example- can end up sparking a chain of much larger ones. You should know that all too well, being an engineer.”**

Truthfully, it had been a long while since she had thought of herself as an engineer- heck, it had been a long while since she had even thought of herself as being _someone_. (Which, when she reexamined her previous… Attitude towards herself and others, showed what she considered to be a _very_ stark contrast.) It was rather ironic, in her opinion- and nearly impossible to believe that she had placed so much of her identity into something that she felt so horribly disconnected with now.

But there was no time for yet another crisis. Ellegaard had decided as of late that she was finished with those- she needed to focus on keeping everything moving.

_“I suppose you’re right,”_ she finally managed to reply.

She continued on after that.

The next day, after the sun had climbed to high noon, she found herself in the middle of a village- just next to the bell, in fact, watching the various robed villagers go about their ordinary business. Growing steadily impatient, she opened her book again:

_“How are they doing now?”_

**“Quite eager, I see. Well, since you’ve asked- the next portal took them to a grand estate, with far more secrets than what meets the eye. Deception runs freely there- thicker than blood.”**

Ellegaard frowned, weaving between two blacksmiths engaged in a vivacious conversation as the gruff tones of their voices carried through the main square. That _wasn’t_ good.

**“As of now, however, they’ve run into a particularly advanced machine that’s managed to surpass its programming entirely. Quite fascinating, don’t you agree?”**

_...Well, yes._ It was _incredibly_ fascinating, and her heart leapt as she took a moment to mull over the possibilities… 

**“Don’t get too excited. It’s also managed to exert a particularly powerful form of control over living beings- which is what your successors are up against, currently.”**

Her face fell. They were in no less danger than they had been before, but she had no armor to offer any of them this time.

_“That reminds me; Scribe, just how many worlds do you observe anyway? Are there others like you to take care of those places, or do you really record_ _everything_ _?”_

**“I record everything that I can see- so because I can see the other worlds, I record their happenings. It’s that simple. If there are others who are meant to accomplish the same, I have yet to meet them.”**

She pursed her lips, breaching the last line of houses at the edge of the village as she turned their statement over in her mind. It was already mind boggling to think that there were so many other worlds out there- she couldn’t help but wonder how long they had been in existence, what civilizations had risen and fell without anyone even knowing. 

For a brief moment, Ellegaard was almost envious. She would have wanted to tag along with them, if she could- even if it meant only watching from a distance. Getting the chance to document and investigate new worlds opened entire realms of new possibilities…

_It would have been fun_ , she admitted to herself. _Especially_ _the redstone device they’re facing..._

_“You must be pretty adept at this to record such an infinite amount of happenings as they all take place. Do you have an infinite number of arms to keep up with all of that?”_

Her mind inserted a half-hearted chuckle into the momentary pause before Scribe’s reply, something she had been finding herself doing more lately. Bleakly, she remarked to herself that perhaps all this time alone was getting to her more than she realized.

**“I have my ways, yes. None of them involve the growing of extra appendages, I’m afraid.”**

And that had been the end of that conversation, Ellegaard slipping back into her own wandering as Scribe returned to.. Well, wherever they always seemed to go when they weren’t writing to her. She had never quite understood how they managed to communicate with her and record events simultaneously, but by this point the thought was already replaced with the steady monitoring of her surroundings- and her wounds.

As more time seemed to race, and then sludge its way past her, she began to take notice of three different things:

One, that the Vex would seem to catch up to her every now and then.

She would make out their porcelain faces between lines of trees, nestled into dark caves and tucked between tall leafy shrubs. Whereas they had always seemed to brandish their swords before, this time proved to be slightly different- they would let their weapons dangle at their sides, dark hollows of eyes peering out at her as she would pass through.

Occasionally, they would call out to her in some form of a spectral whisper, extending their gash-streaked arms towards her in what she could only assume was an invitation of some sort. Ellegaard herself was perfectly content to ignore them- so long as they didn’t attack her, there was no reason for her to engage with them in any way. They always seemed to make themselves scarce after she would refuse, shaking her head at their faded blue figures as they slowly withdrew into themselves- and although their retreat was speedy, it didn’t stop her from breaking into a run as soon as she deemed the coast to be clear.

She knew full well who they worked for. And she had no intention of getting lured anywhere else.

Her second observation was no less peculiar, flickering in and out of the corners of her vision when her head was turned away. At first, Ellegaard had thought it to be merely the Vex again, seeking to trick her- but this was different.

Ellegaard had been coming down the side of a mountain when she saw it first, a momentary hitch in the stretch of land that lay to her left. She had turned her head to get a better look, squinting in an attempt to make herself _focus_ \- but whatever had happened was gone, and with zero indicator as to what it even was. It didn’t make her any less cautious, however- and the instance, albeit strange, seemed to only have been a one time occurrence so far. She chose to file it below the small section of notes she had been compiling on the Vex, just under “ _Particularly dangerous swords”_ and _“strange red gashes akin to mine.”_

Which… Led her to her third observation.

The wounds were spreading.

Had she not been checking them meticulously, she doubted she would have even noticed the small shift- the way the gash at her middle had steadily begun to extend itself upwards, snaking ever so slowly in a manner that made her heart plummet.

When she had first laid eyes on it, momentarily distracted from a small sugarcane farm, she had even doubted that it was real. _It had to be a trick of the mind_ , she rationalized, or some other panicked illusion her brain had managed to conjure up. Breath hitching, and hands shaking, she had gingerly lifted her right arm to compare- praying throughout the entire jerky movement that the injury hadn’t changed.

Sure enough, it sported a new branch of its own- beginning to sprawl downwards towards the back of her hand, and still retaining its same screaming crimson that made her want to hide her arm entirely.

Ellegaard pursed her lips, frowning deeply as she narrowed her eyes. There was something wrong, she was sure of it- and she had just begun to lift her book to press Scribe on _what in the world this seemed to be_.

But this time, her only answer was an empty chest- tucked just between the tall stalks of sugarcane and hardly visible through the tall shoots of green.

There was one beat. Then two.

Finally, letting out a shaky sigh as she did so, she lifted the chest’s dull clasp and placed her book inside. It seemed she would have to receive this answer another time, despite the uneasy feeling that had seemed to settle permanently in the pit of her stomach.

The chest remained there, waiting, as she turned away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woohoo, finally got this one done!! ☺️☺️ (With no thanks to a _certain_ google doc goof-up!!)  
> This chapter took me much longer than I wanted it to, but I think I'm really satisfied with how it came out- I was excited to expand more on some plans!! 😊 Thank you so much for reading- I hope you enjoyed, and I hope you're safe and healthy!!


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